


Postcards

by GSJwrites



Category: Glee
Genre: Klaine, M/M, Postcards
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-11
Updated: 2013-04-02
Packaged: 2017-12-05 00:24:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 38,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/716755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GSJwrites/pseuds/GSJwrites
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kurt and Blaine's relationship survived their separation when Kurt moved to New York. Settled and happy four years later, can they make it through another farewell when Blaine gets offered the chance of a lifetime in Los Angeles? Blaine falls for the city, and embarks on a letter and postcard writing charm initiative to convince a less-than-enthusiastic Kurt to join him on the West Coast.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Just migrating this over from S&C. This was my first fanfic, which I posted September-November 2012. I'll post a chapter a day here on A03 until it's up.

****

****

**Spring 2013**

It took Blaine Anderson exactly 2.3 seconds to make the biggest decision of his young life. 

Acceptance letter in hand, he was headed to Juilliard's School of Music, no ifs, ands or OSUs.

There were plenty of schools across the country that would meet his academic needs. But none was closer to his heart than Juilliard. Because for the past 10 months, his  heart resided in a tiny, borrowed Upper West Side apartment in New York City.

His first move was to his phone, where he snapped a picture of the admissions packet. It was promptly texted to one Kurt Hummel.

The response was immediate:

_What do we have here?_

Hello New York!

 _Hello, love,_ Kurt wrote back.

So Blaine politely declined Oberlin. And Berklee. And Northwestern. And USC. He had passed over NYU's Tisch School because at this stage of his life, he wanted to focus on the music, not the business of music. 

And he had refused to apply to NYADA, despite Kurt's gentle encouragement. "It's not what I want, Kurt," Blaine explained, though Kurt knew better, and loved him all the more for it. He understood Blaine's nature: He was fiercely loyal, and could hold a grudge -- be it against bullies or academic institutions. He planned to study in New York, yes, but not at the school that nearly crushed the boy who owned his heart.

When all was said and done, with mortarboards tossed and goodbyes said, Blaine packed his belongings in record time. 

True to his vow, he moved to New York shortly after his high school graduation, considering his departure the best possible graduation gift.

****

They made it work.

Despite complications, such as the unexpected news that Blaine must live on campus his freshman year at Juilliard. They had already established a home blocks from campus in the borrowed studio apartment of Cooper Anderson, who had a longterm commitment in Los Angeles and refused to accept rent, asking only that the apartment be kept "clean and fabulous."

Despite the roommate, who thankfully found a girlfriend about  _a week_  into the school year.

Despite the competing school and work schedules which left them with few weekday hours together.

Despite their equally guarded, private reservations that somehow this couldn't be so easy 

They made it work, largely by sticking to their plan.

On weekdays, Blaine stayed close to campus. He often either had to perform in or attend evening concerts, and the fact that the dormitories had well-appointed practice rooms  _was_  a bonus. On those nights when Blaine awoke with a start around 3 am, he'd wander down the hall in sweats and scruff, seal himself off in a practice room and pour his excess energy into the piano. 

Kurt's weekdays weren't much better. Enrolled at Parsons New School of Design nearly a year after his high school graduation, his schedule was awash with design labs, workshops and portfolio reviews, plus seminars designed to integrate new students into New York arts and culture. He spent five days a week in studio classes, and sat in on career panels and guest lectures to absorb as much of the academic environment as possible. His available time was spider web thin, and rarely synced cleanly with Blaine's equally-limited moments of freedom.

But on the weekends, they devoted themselves to each other.

Saturdays were abuzz with activity: Museums, window shopping, sharing a little picnic in lottery ticket lines for Broadway shows, then enjoying a dessert and coffee in a Hell's Kitchen restaurant after the show.

Sundays were for lingering.

They loitered in bed, touching, tasting, hovering on the precipice of sleep, only to be drawn into delirium with the wisp of a fingertip and the brush of a tongue.

Blaine, generally unwilling to unravel himself from Kurt's arms, would rise slowly and dress with little thought in a t-shirt and jeans to fetch a Sunday Times (" _Sunday is the day you read a real paper, not a laptop, Kurt._ ") while Kurt toiled on his pre-planned Sunday brunch menu. Today, lemon ricotta pancakes, next week, spinach-feta omelets.

Somehow, by the time Blaine returned with the paper, Kurt had perfected his gravity-defying hair. Blaine had no idea how he did it, but his internal voice whispered a little 'thank you' every time it happened. Blaine would pause, and stare. Because Kurt Hummel, perfected, never failed to take his breath away.

They would eat side-by-side, or sometimes return to bed, sharing a meal and exchanging sections of the paper. Blaine would start with world news, or the sports section. Kurt had long ago called first dibs on arts and entertainment.

If they were accused of being an old married couple in high school, their friends should see them now.

On sunny Sunday afternoons, they would stroll hand-in-hand through Central Park, watching the frisbee dogs, the Tai Chi classes, the parents pushing strollers and the elderly couples lovingly sharing a park bench. To the latter, they would stop, smile, then share a knowing look.

Marriage was an inevitability, they knew, but as anxious as they were to be together, neither felt compelled to rush into an exchange of wedding vows. There was time for that. After college.

After career plans had been charted and launched.


	2. Chapter 2

**New York  
** **April 2016**

The combination of academic schedules, work demands and the sheer pace of New York set a hectic tempo that ultimately suited the couple well. By their third year in college, they had settled into a rhythm that felt normal, if not natural.

Cooper had finally acquiesced on letting them sublet the apartment, rather than borrow it. It had been a huge financial leg up to live rent-free for as long as they had, but the generosity weighed heavy on Kurt's conscious and on Blaine's want for privacy.

"Seriously Kurt, he could walk in here  _any_  time -- and he would, just for fun."

They had been able to save a surprising amount of money from Kurt's Starbucks job  and his low-paying but door-opening internship with Christian Siriano.

Blaine earned extra money as a rehearsal pianist at the vocal school, and occasionally got side gigs singing with a friend's band at weddings and bar mitzvahs. It wasn't exactly the Lincoln Center, but it paid the bills. He had long-ago rejected his parents' strings-attached offers of financial assistance.

With the passing of his 21st birthday, the couple could visit the city's clubs without having to use the old fake IDs, procured by Sebastian years before, that Kurt wished they'd torched immediately after their first use. 

Their favorite wasn't one of the city's countless dance clubs, but a piano bar on Restaurant Row. The main bar would fill up rapidly with the after-theater crowds on the weekend, but only the locals and well-acquainted seemed to know about the side room, a cozy bar tucked behind the main stage, frequented by a regular crowd of Broadway musicians, singers and actors. This was Kurt and Blaine's favorite after-hours spot, where they could relax, sing and enjoy Broadway performers testing their limits and pushing each others' buttons.

Patrons wandered into the room, music binders in hand, ready to offer up sheet music to the evening's featured pianist, who doubled, tripled, quadrupled as host-bartender-cheerleader. The music was a heady mix of Broadway standards and pop music classics. 

The twosome sometimes ended up at the mic, with Kurt happy to exercise his voice and once again share a moment on stage with the boy who once publicly wooed him with a breakup song. Rachel occasionally tagged along, never shy about taking a stage and eager to up her profile as she nervously approached her NYADA graduation.

Blaine was far more comfortable in the small darkened bar than he had ever been in the well-equipped rehearsal rooms of Juilliard.

So when one of the resident performer/bar tenders pulled him aside to tell him that he'd gotten a job playing for a new show that would force him to quit the bar, Blaine jumped at the opportunity.

Though he often came home smelling like a Long Island Iced Teas, Blaine treasured his new night job.

The musical selection for the bar was decidedly un-Juilliard, and gave him an

excuse to play and sing the Broadway and pop tunes that were his first musical love. He could even take advantage of the occasional quiet weeknight in the side bar to test his own material in front of a small and friendly audience.

Kurt would often drop by late in the shift, sometimes joining Blaine on the stage to take a pass at a pop song from their days singing along to the radio on their way to McKinley. Even though Kurt had long since turned his back on performance as a career, his soaring counter tenor could knock the breath from Blaine's chest. 

"You still know how to make me swoon," he would whisper to Kurt as the song ended.

****

Just as Kurt's ambitions shifted, unexpectedly and successfully, between high school and college, Blaine's goals also realigned.

His tepid 'maybe someday' stage ambitions had taken a decided back seat to music. And while performing had been his love since childhood, composing music had emerged as his passion in college.

He spent countless late night hours in campus practice rooms working on new music, or sat quietly on the couch, a guitar in his lap, testing new riffs. He carried with him, at all times, a tiny Moleskine notebook to capture a fleeting lyrical phrase.

With that passion grew an interest in learning the art of producing music. And while Juilliard had given Blaine a world-class education in music theory, composition and voice, it did not provide the basic job skills of the recording industry that Blaine felt he needed to reach his goals.

He would not be a concert pianist. Or an opera singer. Or a conductor.

He wanted, one day, to write and produce his own music. Hopefully with some success, at least enough to cover matrimony and mortgage ("And," Kurt would add, "minions").

He knew his education was somewhat off-track for his goals, but he would come home after a day of music theory lectures, or a night of juggling bar tending duties with leading a chorus of "New York, New York," and he would smile. 

He would smile when he looked up at the growing collection in the Museum of Fine Neckwear and Foldable Clothes, the adopted name for a glorified series of tie racks and shelves Kurt had built early on to accommodate their combined wardrobes in the minuscule apartment.  Over three years, it had become as much an evolving piece of seasonal art as a means of storing sweaters and bow ties.

 

He would smile as he listened to Kurt's regularly scheduled cajoling of his father to eat egg white-spinach wraps, not muffins, for breakfast. On the surface, it may have sounded like a father being harangued about his diet, but what Blaine heard was the deep love of a devoted son for his father.

He would smile as he sat awake in the middle of the night, watching the pale form next to him breath in a steady rhythm, or as he gazed into the bright blue eyes looking up at him as they made lazy love on a Sunday morning. 

Blaine Anderson had happily traded opportunities for smiles, and he had considered it a bargain. Career plans could be adjusted.

Life plans could not.

****

His first time at the bar, Cameron Elliott was with a lively group of friends, fresh from orchestra seating at a musical staging of  _Oh Brother Where Art Thou_. The show became an unexpected smash and had recently swept 10 Tony categories. It was impossible to get tickets, unless you lived in the rarified air of a music mogul. 

The group, laughing loudly, took turns telling bawdy stories and occasionally joining in the sing-along songs.

"You recognize someone?" asked Angie, a lanky redhead who recently lost her job in the chorus of an ill-fated revival of Xanadu and now worked alongside Blaine in the side bar.

"That's the recording industry," Blaine said, sounding slightly dazed.

"All of it?" 

"Might as well be. In the middle? The guy in black? With the horn rims and Kangol cap? That's Cameron Elliott."

Angie looked at Blaine with a "Am I supposed to be impressed?" expression on her face.

"A producer. THE producer. The man behind NSO Music. If you don't know who he is, you should."

"Better be on your A-game tonight, handsome," she said with an uncaring laugh, grabbing her tray and hitting the floor.

Truer words had never been spoken. And Blaine didn't need to hear it. He repeatedly stretched his fingers. He wrapped his break, approached the piano and took a centering breath, closing his eyes briefly before rolling into his routine.

"Welcome to Mamas. Home of has-beens, wannabe's, never-beens and maybe somedays. But we have something in common: We live for music, and we smell like stale beer."

He dared a glance to the back of the room where the table erupted in laughter -- and Cameron Elliott sat still, glancing up at the stage, iPhone in hand.

Blaine reeled off a couple of quick, acrobatic scales and dove headlong into "As Time Goes By." The song was a classic, and a proven crowd-pleaser. The drunker the audience, the more vocal the sing-along. Tonight would not be a night for walkups and borrowed sheet music. This would not be an open mic night. This was the night Blaine Anderson had readied himself for, consciously or not, since childhood.

He dove deep into his repertoire of Broadway, classics and Top 40, even singing some of the Katy Perry songs that he had largely abandoned after high school, stripping down "[Teenage Dream](http://youtu.be/B_V9HCYNGOg)" into a slow, romantic ballad.

Cameron Elliott remained passive. Attentive, but unreadable. And after a couple of hours, he was gone.

****

Blaine saw him again two nights later, tucked discreetly by himself in a dark corner of the side room late in the shift. He answered texts or emails on his phone while he sipped a scotch.

_Keep your cool, Blaine. Finish your set and just don’t screw up._

He tilted the scales a little heavy toward pop songs, with just enough Broadway to stay true to the bar’s roots:

[ _Luck Be a Lady_](http://open.spotify.com/track/4rs9LxtyvcOjJRyIBY8N6q) from Guys and Dolls, because Frank Loesser epitomizes Broadway music.

[ _Paris Ooh La La_](http://open.spotify.com/track/5zUM7V4ZdtkprqB2VkOnbe), by Grace Potter and the Nocturnals, because damn, that’s just one sexy song, and he could get a crowd all in with it.

[ _Tempted_  ](http://open.spotify.com/track/1vTDAqinJpphQVTzB0ohlU)by Squeeze, because he felt it was one of the best crafted, underrated pop songs, ever.

[ _Hey Jude_](http://open.spotify.com/track/0G1FTLduZMUBxaFShyl79i)by the Beatles, because not only did it have a lovely melody, but he knew he could rock those screams.

Ninety minutes later, with patrons beginning to trickle out for the night, he took a chance and played something no one would be able to sing along to. He sang one of his original songs, [a song of love and determination](http://open.spotify.com/track/05pKAafT85jeeNhZ6kq7HT) with a mid-tempo pace that hinted of reason to be optimistic. 

After the bar had cleared, Cameron Elliott approached the piano as Blaine packed his sheet music for the night.

"Nice job. You mix it up well. Kept everyone engaged, but kept them on their toes, too," he said, extending his hand. "Cameron Elliott."

****

Blaine could scarcely navigate the road that led him to this awkward moment. 

It was 11am the next day, and Kurt had asked the standard "How was your night, honey?" question. Should he answer honestly? Completely? Tell him that the Saturday night shift may have been a game changer? That his set may have ended at 1 am, but his evening didn't wrap until long past 3. Because he was engrossed in conversation about music and ambition and the future with a person who could make those dreams come true, the dreams he hadn't even defined as  _dreams_  in several years.

Because he knew if he did answer honestly, he could end up with one of two dramatically different reactions.

"Close out the bar last night?"

"Mmmm. Kind of," Blaine answered, noncommittal.

The answer planted a seed of a worry line across Kurt's forehead, and Blaine quickly corrected.

"You know who Cameron Elliott is? He was in the bar last night, and a couple of nights before that."

Kurt may know not have known the particulars of Elliott's resume, but he knew this much: Blaine knew him by name, recognized that he patronized the bar -- twice -- this week, and seemed struck by it. This had to be big.

"Scouting?" Kurt asked.

"Maybe."

"Anyone in particular? Maybe looking for a handsome, stylish, curly-haired, swoon-worthy new singer? 'Cuz I don't know  _any_  of those," Kurt said with a sassified wink.

Blaine laughed, and the tension dropped from his shoulders.

"He introduced himself at the end of my set. We talked for a while."

****

"So tell me something. You write pop songs. You sings standards -- beautifully, by the way -- and let’s face it, you're interested in  _my_  job someday," Cameron had said, disarming Blaine with his bluntness.

Blaine looked mildly shocked, then dipped his head and chuckled quietly to himself. The old shy school boy still made an appearance from time to time.

"If I'm reading you right, if that's your ambition, what are you doing at Juilliard? And don't give me that world-class education crap. It's not world class if it's not what you need. What's your story?"

So Blaine told him, told him the entire thing, held nothing back.

"You're a natural pop star, and you're getting classical training ... because of a boy?"

 _Because of the boy_ , Blaine thought to himself.

"There's more to it than that. I have learned, I've learned so much ... composition ..." he stammered.

"Yes, yes, yes. You've received an outstanding, formal, theoretical education that few people in my industry have. But at the end of the day, what will you have to market yourself with after you graduate? Have you thought about it?"

Blaine's face dropped.

"You've got the skills. That last one was original, wasn't it? It might be interesting to see what we could do with that in a studio. With the right experience, the right contacts, you might be able to make something of yourself.  And I'm not talking piano bars and bar mitzvahs.

"If you can talk that man of yours into a West Coast break, give me a call."

Blaine took his card, and rolled it in his fingers.

"Think about it. I can't guarantee anything long term, but I could set you up with a summer internship, maybe a job as an assistant. It would be a chance to see the industry at work, and learn a little about working a booth," Cameron said. "And maybe we can try you out in a studio."

****

Blaine rolled the card through his fingers as he told the story, just as he had early that morning in the bar, unable to meet Kurt's gaze.

And when he finished, each was reluctant to speak first. The tension built with each second of silence.

"You haven't graduated yet," Kurt said.

"It's not permanent. It would just be an internship."

"In L.A."

"In L.A., for a few months."

"In L.A. That's 2,500 miles away, Blaine. Lima-to-New York was a morning commute compared to that."

"It's an incredible opportunity to learn the business, Kurt. To learn the things I'm not getting in college. To make contacts that could help me start my career."

Blaine rarely lost his temper with Kurt, but he could feel his blood pressure start to climb. He'd made compromises for years on Kurt's behalf, accommodations that he'd never thought twice about, because his boyfriend's happiness meant everything to him. But what was unravelling before him made him question whether Kurt was capable of a similar sacrifice on his behalf.

"I'm not you're pet, Kurt. I can't follow you around like a lap dog. I changed high schools for you. I was stuck alone in Lima for a year, planning how to follow you here. I chose a college that wasn't really right for me so I could be with you. I've never complained because I'm happy when I’m with you. I love you. I want to be with you for the rest of my life, but first I want to make something of my life.

"Don't I deserve a chance to define myself as something more than just your boyfriend? More than the guy that tags along? I want to be more for you. I want a career, and I've got a chance here. One of the biggest names in the music industry approached me --  _he approached me_ ,  _Kurt_  -- and offered me a chance to get my foot in that door. Can you give me this? Can you give me three months?"

Kurt was dumbfounded at the outburst.

"I've never treated you like a lap dog," he said, his hushed tone scarcely more than a whisper.

"I just want a chance, Kurt. That chance is in L.A., over the summer break. Then I'm back to finish my degree. Back to you."

"I see. This is about you making sacrifices and me being selfish."

"I didn't say that, Kurt..."

Kurt whirled around, ending up nose-to-forehead with Blaine. "You did! That's exactly what you said. You've given. I've taken. I get it."

"Kurt, it's temporary. It's an amazing opportunity. It's always where my life's been headed."

"I thought  _I_  was where your life was."

Blaine took a breath, and a moment. Then he shifted direction, looking to stop the downward spiral of the conversation.

"No. No, Kurt. You are. Always. Don’t. Please. Just don't. We can handle this. It was just an idea, Kurt. ... I don't have to go, not if it's going to do  _this_  to us."

"I'll never say goodbye to you, Kurt."

Kurt's expression appeared to soften, slightly. He looked away, sighed, held the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger and shook his head. 

_"That's my line."_

He glared at Blaine, picked up his keys and walked out.

****

Kurt sat on the couch, unloading his mind, his anger and his heavy conscience while Rachel dished out a truly awful vegan vanilla bean ice cream.

"He acts like going to Juilliard --  _Juilliard_  -- is a sacrifice," he said, knowing he was bordering on whining. "He didn't have to go there. He could have gone to NYU, or taken the music circuit at Parsons, or NYADA for heavens' sake."

"You know he wouldn't have gone there. He didn't want to do anything that would hurt you."

"But that's exactly what he's doing right now," Kurt said, the tears starting to fall. "Why Los Angeles? Why is that necessary? New York has a music scene."

"But L.A. has  _the_  music scene, at least for what he does," Rachel countered. "The pop music industry is to Los Angeles what Broadway is to New York."

Kurt shot her a piercing stare.

"Oh, don't give me  _The Look_ , Kurt Hummel. I’ve known you far too long to be intimidated by that.

“Have you ever stopped and asked yourself what Blaine would be doing right now if you two had never met? Would he be at Juilliard?  _Would he even be in New York_? I think he'd probably wound up at Berklee, or he'd already be in L.A. His brother's there, and so is the center of the music industry.

"New York's fine if he wants to be in a little band with cultish Twitter following. Maybe he'd even get a recording contract, but if Blaine's going to make a go of pop music, if he's going to produce, if he's going to be truly successful in a way that we all know he can be, it would be smart for him to try to make a go of it in L.A.

"And he'd be a fool to turn this opportunity down, Kurt. Would it be any different for you if the roles were reversed?"

Kurt bit his lip.

"He's here for  _you_ , pure and simple. And you  _know_  that, so what's all the fuss about?"

Her words stung like lemon juice splashing on a paper cut. Ultimately, they didn’t hurt him, but they caused a rapid jolt of awareness Kurt would rather do without.

He had difficulty summoning an honest answer, but ultimately caved.

"I don't want to lose him.”

"And who was it that walked out?"

****

Kurt returned after dusk to a darkened apartment. He wouldn't be surprised if Blaine had left, headed to the gym or a campus practice room. He used both in equal doses to work out his anxieties.

But when Kurt turned on the light, there sat Blaine, red-eyed and arms folded tightly across his chest, staring at the coffee table, rocking slightly. His eyes didn't stray, even as Kurt entered the room.

Moments of awkward silence eventually broke, with little acknowledgement or movement.

"How's Rachel?"

Kurt dared another glance in his direction.

"Smarter than me," he said, kicking at the floor. "Something I will  _never_  admit to publicly."

Blaine slowly raised his sight from the table to Kurt's face, his pained expression opening the door, only slightly, to an explanation.

"I'm an idiot," Kurt said, moving toward the couch. He stepped slowly and cautiously, like he was approaching an injured animal. "I shouldn't have reacted like that."

Blaine nodded, directing his focus just below Kurt's eyes. He remained silent.

"You're right. You've supported everything I've done. But when you asked me to do the same, I walked out. I shouldn't have reacted like that, Blaine. And I'm sorry. So very sorry."

Kurt moved closer still, reaching for Blaine's hand. He gently bumped their foreheads, then leaned in further, to kiss Blaine softly on the jaw.

It took a few moments before Blaine finally responded, turning and opening his lips slightly before slipping the tiniest of sighs into Kurt's mouth.

"No matter when happens, I promise to make this work, Kurt."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoa, this was written before the Teenage Dream/acoustic rocked Klainers' collective world last fall. Kind of jarring to revisit that now, but oh well — that interpretation doesn't exist in this verse, happily.


	3. Chapter 3

**Memorial Day Weekend, 2016**

 

The flight -- the first of three in the cheapest possible cross-country trek -- left far too soon after Blaine’s final class, as far as Kurt was concerned. They had a grand total of 14 hours between the end of Juilliard’s spring semester and the beginning of their separation, and he had scarcely packed.

Blaine didn't consider it all that complicated, really. Blue Jeans. Red Jeans. Mustard jeans. A pair of dress slacks. A couple of pinpoint oxford shirts. Polos.  _Plenty_  of polos. A sweater or two. A jacket that could be dressed up in a pinch. A few bow ties, selected to coordinate with as many outfits as possible. Shoes. Maybe a pair of socks.

Kurt disagreed, of course, and would have started the planning for optimum suitcase usage weeks ago if his heart was into it at all, but he left it to Blaine. It would be finished faster this way, anyway.

He watched the proceedings propped up on the bed, sketch pad in hand and glasses pushed down his nose, occasionally lending an opinion.

"Left hand or right hand?" Blaine would ask, holding up two similar belts.

"Left. Definitely left," Kurt would say, peering over the top of his glasses. 

"Wayfarers or Aviators?"

"Mmmmm. I like both on you. But the Wayfarers are very  _Boys of Summer_."

"And don't forget The Anderson," he added, pointing out Blaine's lucky bow tie, a diamond-pointed, dual fabric slimline of a deep red jacquard with subtle navy and green stripes. Kurt called it The Anderson "because it hints at your inner Warbler, but adds layers of complexity." It had been the first of many that Kurt designed and made for him, often from selvage of his own designs. 

The bulging suitcase zipped and stored by the door, Blaine collapsed dramatically backwards into the mattress with a dramatic "oomph."

Kurt continued his sketch, scarcely glancing up.

Blaine stretched his neck around to look up toward the headboard, a smile creeping across his lips.

"I sleep  _really_  well on planes."

His fingers ghosted along Kurt's calf.

"That's nice."

"And I only have a few hours before I need to be up and dressed."

He lingered at Kurt's knee, drawing circles on his pajama pants.

"MmHmm."

"So it wouldn't make a lot of sense for me to go to sleep now. I'll only interrupt my REM cycle with the alarm," he said, leaning over to nuzzle Kurt's toes.

Kurt looked down at Blaine, now flashing a lascivious grin and raising his eyebrows suggestively, and set the sketchpad aside.  

"Wouldn't want to interrupt your REM cycle," Kurt said, removing his glasses.

Blaine clambered up his body, peppering his legs, his belly and his chest with light, breathy kisses. He dawdled at Kurt's neck, because Kurt's neck was always worth an extended visit.

He tongued at the sternal notch. He would  _live_  there, given the chance. He would also change its name, because it deserved to be called something so much sexier than 'supersternal notch.' He moved on to suck at Kurt's Adam's apple as he raked his fingers through his hair.

That was it. Any attempts by Kurt to appear aloof to  _Frisky Blaine_  ran fleeing from the room.

He arched his back and grabbed at Blaine's old Dalton t-shirt, running his hands up and down his chest, pulling the age-softened cotton along for the ride.  _There is absolutely no way that t-shirt is leaving this apartment,_  Kurt vowed silently to himself.  _It smells like morning dew and salt and puppies and Blaine and allgoodthingsonthisearth  ... and I'm keeping it if its the last thing I do._

Kurt yanked the shirt up and over Blaine's head, tossing it to a far corner where he hoped it would go unnoticed. His hands settled just above the rise of Blaine's ass, thumbs toying with the waistband of his sweatpants. 

Blaine's mouth migrated behind Kurt's ear and Kurt could feel his pulse quicken to match the rhythm of the heated breath along the side of his neck. 

Blaine pressed his hips down into Kurt, and with a tiny upward thrust, drove them into an increasingly syncopated rhythm.

"Clothes ... off," Kurt said in his final moments of coherence. 

Blaine was happy to oblige. He reached down to grab the hem of Kurt's tank top, peeling it away with one hand, skating down Kurt's chest with the other. Kurt raised his hips as Blaine wrestled his pajama pants free, taking a slight detour for a quick grab of ass.

Kurt kicked his pajamas free and got to work untying and removing Blaine's sweats in short order. They were scarcely free of Blaine's ankles when Kurt grabbed his face and kissed him deeply,  then breaking to set his palm in front of Blaine's mouth with a direct, breathless command.

"Lick."

Blaine nodded a hazy yes, and tongued a sloppy path across Kurt's outstretched palm. Kurt then took Blaine in hand, starting a slow, rhythmic stroke that prompted a gasp, then a prolonged moan. He picked up the pace, twisting, stroking, then thumbing at the head before starting the whole process over again. Blaine responded by turning up the volume of his increasingly delirious cries.

All Blaine could do was moan and grab. Grab at the sheets. Grab at the pillows. Grab at Kurt. Grab at anything that could anchor him to this bed. "Oh shit, Kurt ... KURT. Whoa. Wait. Need. Slow. Need. You.  _God_."

Kurt somehow got the message, and slowed his forceful strokes to a gentle massage, giving both a moment to catch their breath and collect their wits.

Blaine grabbed Kurt's face and kissed him, softly at first, then with a persistent build to something greater. He sucked Kurt's lower lip between his teeth, then pierced Kurt's mouth with an inquisitive tongue.

His hands grazed the soft skin beneath him, and marveled. He mouthed his way down Kurt's body, grazing a nipple between his teeth, rolling it with his tongue. His kissed his way across his chest, assuring both nipples of equal time, then nibbled his way down Kurt's rib cage.

Kurt gripped the pillow behind his head and let out a guttural moan. "Want your mouth," he said. "Please, Blaine." 

Blaine didn't need to be asked twice. 

He nosed Kurt's cock, exhaling deeply along the overheated skin. He lapped at the pre-cum collecting at the head, and then took it into his mouth to suck lightly  before shifting his attention to the entirety of Kurt's length, tongue-tracing the prominent lower vein from head to groin. His tour continued to Kurt's balls, which he rolled, one then the other, in his mouth before heading north once again.

"Blaine, please!" Kurt gasped. "Please."

Blaine finally sunk his mouth fully over Kurt's cock, taking it in one thrust of Kurt's hips, then pulling up slowly with a solid press of his tongue. He lingered again at the head, kissing and tonguing at the slit, and following up with a delicate twist of his wrist. 

Then he was down again, relaxing his throat to take in all Kurt could give him.

Kurt reached behind his head, clawing at the pillow with one hand, pawing at Blaine's unraveling curls with the other. He was lost in the moment, but remained lucid enough to know this would be the last time he would feel Blaine on him for three months, if not longer. It made him want to keep it going as long as possible, so he reluctantly pushed Blaine off of him. It was his turn to slow things down.

"Want more," Kurt said. "Need less."

Blaine pulled up, humming quizzically.

"So close, Blaine. Want more time."

Blaine nodded, rubbing Kurt's chest affectionately while his other hand served as a slow, rhythmic substitute for his mouth. 

Though they now were deeply familiar with each other's scents, sounds and  idiosyncrasies, these moments had yet to grow old. Blaine was mesmerized by just how fresh it still felt. Each and every time they were together, he felt he discovered something new.

The tiny freckle to the left of Kurt's nipple. Had he noticed that before? It merited a kiss.

That little wrinkle by his nose? That had to be new. Kiss.

And that sound Kurt made a moment ago. Was it a sigh? A moan? It was certainly something uniquely Kurt. Kiss.

Blaine took a lingering look down at Kurt and caressed his forehead, his eyebrows, his eyelids and more, mapping his face with butterfly kisses. Then he let his tongue take a pass at Kurt's ear. Kurt's sighs turned to soft moans, and Blaine grinned. "Better?"

"Yes," Kurt murmured.

"Ready?"

"Mm hmm."

"Let's  _dance_ ," he said in a deep murmur. Kurt recognized their longstanding code, and eagerly flipped Blaine on his back, straddling his hips.

Kurt stretched to reach their supplies from the nightstand, while Blaine ran his hands up and down Kurt's chest. He circled each nipple, then let his hands drift down to that soft  dusting of hair leading down from Kurt's navel.

"Hand," Kurt said, holding the bottle of lube.

Blaine held his hand out, and warmed to slippery liquid by rolling his fingers together.

"Up, Kurt."

He circled Kurt's perineum, widely at first, drawing closer to his target with each concentric pass. It was nearly too much for Kurt, and not nearly enough.

"C'mon Blaine. Please," he said, panting.

With that, Blaine slipped a finger through the tight ring of muscle. Moments or minutes later, another. Eventually another.

"Blaine! Please. Now," Kurt huffed.

Blaine reached for the familiar foil packet, and when he didn't find one began looking around the bed. Kurt grabbed Blaine's hand and shook his head. "Not this time. Need to feel you."

They had been each others' first in high school, and had stayed together ever since, so it certainly wasn't the first time they'd foregone a condom, but it also wasn't their norm. Neither one really wanted to deal with the mess involved in going without, so they just made it part of their routine.

"Want to feel you, Blaine. Please," Kurt begged again, running his hand up and down his arm. Blaine nodded his assent, and eased his fingers out. Kurt squeezed some lube into his own hands, and gave Blaine's cock a last few strokes before lining it up to his slick hole.

Blaine reached up and held Kurt's hips still, easing himself in enough to ensure they were secure, looking into Kurt’s eyes to confirm  _This is OK, right?,_  then setting in, gently at first, then with a solid thrust fully encasing himself in Kurt's heat.

Kurt gasped, shut his eyes and waited. Blaine gave him time to adjust, lightly fondling his hip bones. He looked on, slightly mesmerized by the sight of Kurt adrift in pleasure. Then he gave Kurt a tentative bump.

Kurt opened his eyes and smiled. 

 _Showtime_. 

He circled his hips, slowly at first, as Blaine began a series gentle, even thrusts. As Kurt picked up the pace, Blaine drove harder, propelling his hips off the bed.

Their "dance" began a few years before, when Burt Hummel decided to share a grainy black and white video with Blaine as a joke. Blaine giggled along with the family, and an  embarrassed Kurt, to the Single Ladies video. But inside? He committed the dance both to his memory and his vivid and colorful imagination. 

It would soon be a sexual request, and later become code for  _Ride me hard_.

Kurt's circles evolved into heated figure eights. Between groans, he urged Blaine on. "C'mon, Blaine, please," he begged. "Harder. Right  _there. There._ Yes. Harder."

Blaine picked up the pace, grabbing Kurt's hips to lift, then plummet him back down on to his cock with each thrust. Kurt leaned forward, grabbed himself in one hand and reached toward Blaine’s heart with the other as their rhythm grew erratic.

And with each surge, Kurt's voice said "Yes," but his heart said,  _No. ... Don't leave me._

 

****

 

The postcard arrived without warning or hoopla three days after Blaine's departure, a water-colored piece of kitschy nostalgia.

_Greetings From California!_

The cheesy graphic, no doubt procured from the airport, or maybe a cheap tourist shop on Hollywood Boulevard, outlined "the Golden State," with artists' rendering of highlights in what were no doubt intended to be geographic-appropriate locations.

A surfer off San Diego.

The Space Shuttle landing in the desert.

The Golden Gate Bridge.

Poppies.

An oil rig off the coast of Santa Barbara. 

Girls in bikinis. 

 _Oh, that really makes me want to visit_ , Kurt thought to himself.

Seriously? Blaine had his goofy moments, but this may top them all. And did he really have to send a reminder that he was a continent away?

_Just landed! Wanted to make sure you got the lay of the land. Here are some highlights!  Text me when you get this._

_I love you._

_B_

_He landed three days ago. We've Skyped each day since. Why is he sending me tacky postcards?_  Kurt thought to himself. Sometimes, there was no explaining Blaine. You just had to go along for the ride.

Kurt grabbed a magnet and posted the card to the side of the refrigerator. He picked up his phone and messaged Blaine.

_OK, I'm game. Explain the mystery of the postcard._

What? No affection? No love? No "I'm missing you already and I will surely die without you?" No "Our last night together shattered me?"

_I'm missing you already. Especially your mouth. What's up with the ugly card?_

So much better! Email explanation to follow. Look for it. <3 you, B

Kurt rolled his eyes, powered up his laptop and logged in to his email. In moments, he received an email with attachments from Blaine. The eye rolling morphed into head-shaking.

TO: Kurt Hummel

FROM: Blaine Anderson

RE: Freeway traffic is monstrous!

Hey Kurt! 

Look what tied up traffic today!  : D 

I've settled into Coop's extra bedroom and unpacked. Nothing too crushed or destroyed, you'll be happy to hear. I know we've talked both days since I've been here, but there's something about devoting time to a letter that just makes me feel that much more connected to you.

Sometimes I think about how history is written -- how letters have documented life, love, diplomatic treaties, shifts in the social structure and even music -- and I think how that can't happen in a world of texts and Skype. That somehow, we're losing something important.

Think about  _The Notebook_  and those 365 letters that went unread, Kurt. Those letters were game-changers. Think about the soldiers who went off to war with letters from their loved ones tucked in their uniforms. Even those vacation postcards our parents used to send home, the "Wish you were here" sentiments.

I wish you were here, Kurt.

And I'm grateful every day that I can hop online and see you, talk to you or somehow communicate with you instantly.

But I think to those old letters and postcards, and how people dedicated themselves to spending time choosing their words, expressing their love, sharing their lives -- and I want to do that, too.

So here's my vow: I will write you, no matter how often we text, or call, or Skype. And anytime I go somewhere new, experience something I haven't seen or heard or smelled or experienced, I will find a way to share that with you, by email, photo or postcard. 

Almost like you're here.

All my love,

B

 

There were times when Kurt couldn't help but roll his eyes and shake his head at Blaine Anderson's attempts at romance. There were other times that his longtime boyfriend left his heart aflutter. The fact of the matter was, Blaine was an old fashioned romantic fool, and Kurt wouldn't change it for the world.

It was clear that Blaine was excited to be in Los Angeles. He was excited to be reunited with his brother, with whom he'd finally forged the brotherly relationship he'd always craved. He was especially excited about starting his job on Tuesday, interning in the executive suite at NSO Music.

And as much as Kurt wanted Blaine to be happy, he couldn't say he entirely shared the sentiment. He had a bad feeling about this, but wanted to avoid the petulance that caused their near-breakup six weeks earlier. So he played along, played the supportive boyfriend.

And it was little more than an acting exercise, because he didn't like this, not one bit.


	4. Chapter 4

At the end of his first work week, Blaine felt like he was at the center of a vortex, like a kid trying to find his footing after twirling his body and twisting his head skyward until he lost balance. It had been a blur of people, policy and pop music.

He didn't expect to land an internship that had him working in the executive suite at NSO, located in the historic Capitol Records building in Hollywood. 

He hadn't expected to meet four Grammy winners in his first week of work.  

He expected to be fetching coffee. Or lunch. Or the mail. 

He didn't expect to be taking notes at strategy meetings, and assisting producers  -- sometimes by fetching coffee -- in production booths. 

His life felt charmed, and he was convinced that he had learned more about the day-to-day workings of the music industry in one week on the job than he had in three years at one of the nation's premier music schools. 

His first day at work, Blaine showed up at the NSO Human Resources office promptly at 8:30 am. “You’re early,” the clerk told him, shoving a clipboard of paperwork his way. “Fill those out, and I’ll need to make copies of your driver's license and Social Security card, then we’ll show you up to 13.” 

His eyebrows shot up.  _Thirteen?_ If anything, he figured he’d be lucky to spend his days in the mail room, or in a reception bay. He did not expect the executive suite. He filled out form after form, verified that he was, indeed, himself and had his picture taken for his office ID. A little over an hour later, the HR clerk escorted him to the elevator and to NSO's 13th floor, the penthouse suite. 

Blaine really had no idea what was in store for him, but he knew it was going to have a hell of a view. The offices in the circular building faced north, looking out toward the Hollywood Reservoir, Griffith Park and the Observatory. Just a little east, within the extended office window view, loomed the Hollywood Sign. 

He didn't have much time to take it in. A towering, serious-looking brunette took him off the clerk's hands and gave him a swift office tour, singling out key executives' offices and introducing him to the collection of assistants. She dared a quick glance at her phone. "Cameron's in the building." 

She directed Blaine to an extra desk in the assistants' pit, then grabbed an iPad and several file folders before meeting Cameron Elliott at the elevator bay. She immediately had his full attention, running through his schedule as she followed him into his office.   

Fifteen  minutes later, she caught Blaine's eye and waved him over. "He'll see you now," she said. Blaine detected the slightest of smiles crossing her face. 

**** 

It was quickly clear that Blaine was to become Cameron's shadow, taking notes, running errands and simply  _absorbing_  everything going on around him. 

It also didn't take long to decipher the upstairs power structure. If you wanted something done at the highest levels, get in the good graces of the executive assistants. Like many offices, the people managing the executives’ calendars and files had more knowledge, trust and power than was apparent to the eye. But Blaine recognized it, cultivated it and was thankful for the fact that they took him under their collective wing. 

“You know, we don’t usually have interns up here,” said Stacey, the very definition of a beach blonde California girl, who also graduated with honors with a management degree from UCLA. “But I don’t think Cam thinks of you as an intern.” 

“Personal assistant, I’d say,” said Christian, a highly regarded staffer who had become as well known for his work in support of LGBT organizations as for being the trusted right hand of NSO's chief financial officer. He was young, smart, fashionable and recognizable in some of the city's prominent circles, and clearly on the fast track. 

“Protegé,” said Susanna, the brunette, ending the debate. "Otherwise, you’d be stewing in a file room all day.” 

As Cameron's longtime executive assistant and considered by many as the power behind the Herman Miller suspension chair, Susanna Weston's opinion carried the weight of the highest level NSO executives, at least unofficially.  There was little doubt that the 40-something single mother could successfully manage her own company, but she was as loyal to her longtime employer and confidante as he was to her. She knew him almost as well as she knew herself.  

“To be honest, I’m not even sure how things all worked out like this,” Blaine confided to her later that week. “I’m not entirely sure what my role is. Not that I’m complaining. It’s just a lot to take in.” 

“Whatever you two talked about in that bar left an impression,” she said, touching his arm supportively. “Good for you. He likes you. He  _sees_ something in you. Take full advantage, enjoy the ride, and let me know what I can do to help.” 

Blaine understood the value of these connections. So he picked up their lunches, baked them cookies and brought a bouquet of flowers for the central staff pit. Sucking up? Maybe. But he liked them, they seemed to like him, and no one was complaining.  

Each day, he made sure he arrived early and left late, and made an effort to Skype with Kurt every night, or at least every other. On the latter, he knew at least that at least the time zone was on his side. 

**** 

By Saturday night, he needed to catch his breath. With Cooper out of town on a shoot, and feeling a little lonely, he ventured to the Hollywood Bowl and bought a $10 nosebleed seat for the outer reaches of the hillside amphitheater. 

Blaine bypassed the moving sidewalk and hiked the steep path to the highest reaches of the cavernous outdoor theater. He settled on a bench seat of section W with his small picnic: A chicken salad from a nearby gourmet sandwich shop, a split of Chardonnay and a sea salt-tipped brownie, an office leftover from a Sweet Lady Jane bakery basket. 

The orchestra took the stage as the sunset cast a pink and orange glow across the white shell behind the Bowl's stage, as well as the tree-lined hillsides surrounding it. The sky gradually deepened to indigo, and the lights rose on the stage.  

That's all it took. 

Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was the Chopin. Maybe it was the fact that he was feeling so completely at ease with the music, the surroundings and the Bowl patrons, who freely shared picnic goodies with their cheap-seat neighbors. 

He couldn’t pinpoint the moment. It may have been during the Nocturne, which had always thrown him for a loop. It may have been when the family behind him insisted that he share their birthday cake and wine. But something about the place, the moment, the music, the city ... felt  _comfortable_. 

Not that he wasn’t settled with his life in New York. He loved Kurt and would, he reassured himself, go to the ends of the earth to be with him. But he'd never felt entirely at home at Juilliard. His job at Mama’s was as much an escape from the campus as it was a means to a paycheck. Yet even there, whether behind the bar or the piano, he always felt like he had to be “on.” 

Right now, he simply felt like  _Blaine, the kid who lived for music._ It was as if his entire body exhaled. But he was also Blaine, the man who was desperately in love with someone utterly disinterested in the West Coast. 

In that moment, a plan was hatched. Blaine snapped pictures and shot video on his cell phone of the romantic Chopin concertos. 

At the end of the evening, as he strolled down the hill towards the shuttle buses, he stopped by the Hollywood Bowl store and bought a postcard.

 

 

 _Kurt,_  

 _My first visit to the Hollywood Bowl! Chopin with the L.A. Philharmonic tonight, & it was wonderful. Picnic, wine & the most beautiful sunset you can imagine. Text me when you get this, and I'll tell you more._ 

 _I love you,_  

_B_

  

Blaine knew that he Kurt would roll his eyes at his choice of postcards -- at the fact that he was mailing postcards at all -- but Blaine was enjoying himself, and felt it was a way to share even more firsts with Kurt. 

And while everything he had told Kurt about writing letters was true, he now had a renewed purpose to his old fashioned correspondence. He wouldn't just share the events of his week, he would show Kurt why he needed to get on a plane. With any luck, Kurt would see what was rapidly becoming very clear to him. 

**** 

Kurt changed into comfortable jeans and Blaine's old Dalton T-shirt before grabbing his laptop and curling into the couch, nonfat mocha at his side. Even the address line got his eyes rolling. 

TO: Kurt Hummel

FROM: Blaine "You Miss More Than Just My Mouth" Anderson

 

Dear Kurt, 

What a week!  

To be honest, so much of it’s just a blur, but every second of it’s been valuable. I’m not even entirely sure why or how this happened, but I’m happy for it, and grateful for it, and plan to learn from it.  

Some of the office assistants nicknamed me "The Protegé" the other day. Can you believe that? I'm not so sure. I'm only here for a little while, after all, and I’m really little more than a glorified gopher. But I learned that they don't normally take on summer interns, or interns at all, at NSO. At times I do think I'm doing the work of a personal assistant, not that I'm complaining.  

I may be following Mr. Elliott around like a puppy, but it means I get to watch him do his job, and I get to meet the people he works with: Artists, producers, technicians, the works. It's a lot to take in, Kurt, and I'm absorbing all I can. 

I've learned so much in so little time. I can see how a career could be workable ... and it doesn't involve weddings or bar mitzvahs. 

I've got so much to learn, but I can see that there's an intersection out there of the things that I'm good at and the things that I love. I haven't hit it yet, but it's down the road, and it can be reached. I'm pretty sure they meet up in my future. 

We've talked about this already, I know. But as much as I miss you, I know that I've taken the right step. I know that I'm growing from this. 

With the amount of time that I'm already spending at work, I haven't had much of a chance to breathe, let alone get to know the city. So with my first day off and Coop out of town, I decided it was time to do something iconic. Something very L.A. Something summer. (No, I didn't go surfing ... but I may have to tuck that idea away for another weekend.) 

I went to the Hollywood Bowl. Of course, you already know that.

 

 

It wasn't just that it was beautiful (it was), or that the music was moving (it was). It was the experience of it all, Kurt. Think about your first Broadway show, or your first visit to Fashion Week. It was  _that_  for me, and I want to experience it with you. So, click the link, then let yourself drift off for a moment, and imagine yourself seated next to me, your hand in mine, in the hills above Hollywood, with a little wine and some truly spectacular brownies -- OK, cheesecake -- and a sunset to die for. This one's for you, Kurt. 

The music is [Chopin's Nocturne #9, Op.2](http://open.spotify.com/track/0Z0P196WGBUJBaVJFv57VF). I think it's one of the most romantic things ever written. It's lovely, it's lonely, it's longing, it's love. It's us, Kurt. All the L's wrapped up in one piano concerto. 

It's music to love to. 

It was a featured piece tonight and it left me feeling something I can scarcely describe. It felt like home.  

But as wonderful as it may be, the music reminded me that this otherwise perfect evening was missing a critical piece that kept it -- and me -- from being complete. 

You, Kurt. 

Is it too early to tell you how much how much I miss you? Can I admit that without you I am not whole? Am I giving too much away to confess how much I would give to have you here with me? 

Not practical, I know. 

But every note, every stanza of that Nocturne reminded me of you. Of us. 

I hope I can share this with you in person. Until then, a little something else, in case Chopin just isn't your thing. 

Love, 

B

 

[ **Click here** ](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgpAFy_HwuA&sns=em)

  

**** 

"Dork." 

Kurt laughed at the final addition, a YouTube link from a Star Wars concert at the Bowl, replete with thousands of waving light sabers, but the rest of the email hardly left him laughing. In the note, he saw something he hadn't seen in a while: The Two Blaines. 

Blaine Number One: The cheerleader. The puppy. The overachiever. The Alpha Gay. 

This was the Blaine that Kurt had met on that staircase at Dalton so long ago, who would bounce with joy at the prospect of a new Katy Perry single, then knock it out of the park when he sang his own cover of it. 

This was the Blaine he'd crushed on, hard, from the moment they met, who was a natural leader, a talented entertainer and a handsome hyper-enthusiast.  

It was the Blaine that was almost too good to be true. 

As he read on, he saw signs of Blaine Number Two. This was the more complex Blaine, the Blaine who, though enormously talented, harbored anxieties over performance and self-esteem. The Blaine who took up boxing after being beaten within an inch of his life. The Blaine who put his passions as well as his challenges under a microscope and puzzled them out, trying to understand them and determined to master them. 

If he crushed on Blaine Number One, he fell in love with the addition of Blaine Number Two, because while the second Blaine was flawed, he was also oh-so-human, and those failings made him so much more real to Kurt. 

Blaine Number Two understood there was darkness in the world, but focused on creating a bright future. Blaine Number One was confident that it already existed, a fact that sometimes worried Kurt. 

Blaine Number Two openly and freely confessed his loneliness, and spent time analyzing a summer concert for signs of love. 

Since the end of high school, Blaine had come to terms with these two distinct sides of his personality and fused them into one complete Blaine. To see these counterpoints so clearly on display sent a shiver of worry through Kurt. 

As much as the second Blaine's romance and longing tugged at Kurt's heart, he could not get past one comment in the earliest part of the note: "I can see that there's an intersection out there of the things that I'm good at and the things that I love. ... I'm pretty sure they meet up in my future." 

And the one that cut through his heart: "It felt like home." 

Did he not think of New York as home? Blaine clearly never felt completely at home at McKinley, just as he lacked a sense of permanence at Juilliard. He never even felt completely comfortable in his own family home, preferring to spend his time at the Hummel-Hudson household. 

But it was always Kurt's perception that their apartment had given Blaine that sense of home he so often lacked -- if not for the Museum of Fine Neck Ware, then at least for the fact that it was  _theirs_. 

It felt like Blaine might be slipping away, and not just for a summer internship.


	5. Chapter 5

 

 

"Why do I have a TMZ postcard in my hand, Blaine?" Kurt said, raising an eyebrow as he held the promotional mailer in his hand for his laptop's camera. 

"Because it's not on the fridge yet?" Blaine said, with his patented "What, me worry?" smile. 

Kurt had been perilously close to nodding off when he got the text from Blaine urging him to meet via Skype before he went to sleep.  Kurt moved his laptop from its usual desktop perch to the bed and rested the computer in his lap, propping himself up with pillows. 

He logged in to find Blaine stretched out on the couch in a short-sleeve Henley and old faded jeans. He was eating an apple, occasionally using a finger to smear it with peanut butter. 

"You're unbelievable," Kurt said, looking mildly skeptical. But he could only side-eye his boyfriend so much, really, for something as ridiculous as taking a celebrity tour of Hollywood run by the biggest and most successful gossip mongers in town. Truth be told, he'd do it himself.  _In a heartbeat._  

A TMZ tour? Really? Strange, maybe, but hardly something to get worked up about. 

But he was curious what prompted the odd choice of entertainment -- and who joined him on the tour. 

"It's the last thing in the world I would have thought to do," Blaine said, methodically licking peanut butter from his index finger. "But it was fun. You would have  _loved_  it." 

There was absolutely no way Kurt was going to confirm that. 

"It was great, Kurt! We saw where Lindsey Lohan crashed her Mercedes ... the first time. And you're not going to believe who we saw." 

"We?" 

"Guess who we saw, Kurt." 

"I can't even hazard a guess, Blaine. Who's 'we'?" 

"Ellen, Kurt! We saw Ellen at a stop light." 

"We?" Kurt repeated, working hard to sound as nonchalant as possible. 

"Friends from work. They booked a party bus tour Friday for the office. Sort of happy hour on wheels ... with celebrity gossip. You would have loved it." 

Blaine went on to describe, in excruciating detail, the tour of Hollywood's seamier hot spots -- of bars and tattoo parlors frequented by celebrities. Of intersections where actors had been arrested for soliciting or where actresses had crashed their luxury cars under the haze of one-too-many cocktails at the Skybar. Of hotels where celebrities had been caught in extramarital trysts, or clubs that doubled as drug dens for the rich and famous.  

He recounted with joy the moment that their little open air bus got to witness a brawl between the costumed characters posing for pictures with Hollywood Boulevard tourists. A scrawny Spiderman and a ratty-looking creature that was apparently supposed to be Hollywood’s most famous mouse came to blows over sidewalk space. Blaine even caught the moment that the mouse removed its oversized head in order to land a better punch. “Battle of the cartoon titans,” Blaine said, fairly giddy over the event.  

Normally, this sort of story was right up Kurt's alley, exactly the sort of thing he'd want to hear every detail of, again and again. Blaine's monologue should have reminded Kurt of all the Sundays when they lingered on the couch, watching Access Hollywood or reading to each other from People magazine. It was their guilty pleasure, something they never shared with anyone but themselves, and there was little doubt that Blaine thought this would be fun for Kurt. 

But no matter how hard he tried to tell himself that Blaine's allowed to have new friends, he couldn't get that nagging question out of his head:  _Who's 'we'?_  

"...But in all honesty, that side of town really isn't for me, Kurt. Hollywood Boulevard is nothing but tourist trinkets and tattoo parlors. And I have no interest in having my picture taken with a guy in a bad, smelly Sponge Bob costume," Blaine said. 

West Hollywood was another matter. Wedged between Hollywood and Beverly Hills, the area was home to fine restaurants, fashionable shops and gay-friendly businesses. And Blaine liked it, apparently quite a lot. 

Kurt had obviously heard about the neighborhood before, but he was surprised how enthusiastically Blaine responded to it. Blaine, the prep school dreamboat and a bit of a traditionalist at heart, was going on and on about the trendy community. 

Kurt figured that Blaine must have discovered the Fred Segal store.

There was more to West Hollywood, Kurt knew. Some of the city's most fashionable restaurants had located there, along with art galleries and boutiques from top designers. It was also home to one of the nation's largest Pride parades. All of which were also available in New York City, Kurt reminded himself. 

"It is to L.A. what Hell's Kitchen is to New York," Blaine said. "We're all going to go to The Abbey one of these nights." 

"We, Blaine?" 

xxxx 

As Blaine went on and on, describing The Magic Castle and detailing the towering hillside homes and rolling panoramas, and frankly, Kurt lost track, because he was stuck on the part where Blaine mentioned going to The Abbey with  _friends_. 

 _We_? Kurt wondered who the 'they' in 'we' was. Were they the same  _we_  from the TMZ Tour? And why were they taking Blaine to a gay bar? Correction. _The_  gay bar. The Abbey's reputation as L.A.'s premier lounge for the LGBTQ community stretched well beyond the city’s limits. 

He remembered all-too-well what happened the last time one of Blaine's new friends suggested visiting the local gay nightspot. That was in Kurt's senior year in high school, when Sebastian got them into that sad excuse for a club and tried to steal Blaine away by getting him drunk and monopolizing him on the dance floor.

Kurt never knew how close -- or whether he came close at all -- to losing his boyfriend to the predatory preppy, but the couple had their first real fight over it, and the aftertaste was bitter to this day 

And 'L.A.'s premier gay bar' sounded like trouble to Kurt. The city was going to have a more diverse, attractive and, Kurt suspected, aggressive community than Lima ever had. And he considered it more of a threat than even New York, where their social lives were so deeply intertwined that they revolved almost exclusively around each other. 

'Sebastian' might very well be the norm in L.A., an Kurt would rather that Blaine not experience that alone. 

"Guess where the owner's from, Kurt?" Blaine said with puppy-like enthusiasm. "Guess!" 

"I haven't a clue, Blaine." 

"Ohio!" 

Kurt let out an audible sigh. 

"So, tell me about your new friends." 

"They're really just colleagues," Blaine said with little apparent thought. 

Kurt grimaced.

"Colleagues who want to take you to The Abbey?" 

Kurt immediately wished he'd used his internal voice on that one. He didn't want Blaine to think that he didn't trust him or, even worse in his eyes, was ... 

"Kurt, are you a little  _jealous_?" asked Blaine, a hint of a smile crossing his lips. 

"No. Of course not. I'm just curious about the new people you're getting to know, and about the tour, and who you're visiting The Abbey with." 

"I haven't visited with anyone. ... But I'd like to go ... with you," Blaine said, dipping his head slightly and dropping his voice. 

"You know that's not possible." 

"Why not, Kurt? You don't have classes right now. I know you've got your jobs, but everyone takes a little time off sometime. C'mon. Just a long weekend. The tour's super gossipy. You'd love it. And  _we_  could go to The Abbey, together. 

"C'mon Kurt. You know how much I miss you." 

"Doesn't sound like you have the time to be missing much." 

"Kurt. I miss you," Blaine said, his voice now soft and low.  His voice dropped a notch further. "Let me show you how much." 

Blaine pushed the laptop back on the table to take in more than just his shoulders and face. He looked straight into the webcam and then slowly peeled off his shirt, revealing a taught torso and a dusting of dark hair. "Let me show you, Kurt."  

Kurt's breath hitched. It wasn't like they hadn't enjoyed all the joys of Skype before, but those times had been scheduled  _Skype dates_. Kurt was caught off guard by this development, not that he was objecting. 

"Blaine?" 

"Can you sit back further on the bed, Kurt? I want to see you," Blaine said, his hands already starting the slow trail south from his chest, stretching down his stomach, following the trail of hair to the waistband of his jeans. He shifted his hands almost imperceptibly so just the tips of his three middle fingers continued the trek along his fly. 

Up, down. Up, down. Up, down. Blaine's fingers traced his hardening cock. He stared directly into the webcam, his whiskey eyes darkening by the second. 

"Kurt, this is how you touched me our first time together." 

And then he closed his eyes and moaned. Lightly. Passionately. And, to Kurt's increasingly attentive senses, erotically. 

From the monitor on Kurt's laptop, Blaine already looked like he was in a state of bliss. His head leaned back, his eyes hooded and his hands occupied. Ugh, his hands were clearly enjoying themselves.

Kurt moved the computer to the foot of the bed on the diagonal from where he lay, then shifted his body up the mattress and higher on to his pillows for support. He could already feel the flush overtaking his cheeks, his neck, his chest. 

"Blaine, can you see me?" he asked softly.  Blaine lifted his headed slightly and acknowledged Kurt with an "Mmm." 

Kurt always felt uneasy initiating Skype or phone sex. It just made him feel a little awkward to be the one to get it started. Blaine, thankfully, had no such inhibitions. In fact, he'd gotten a fairly substantial head start on Kurt.

"Blaine, your hands are my hands, OK?" 

"Mmmm-kay." Blaine, distracted, responded. 

"I want you to unbutton the top of your jeans for me." Blaine did as he was told, and preemptively slipped his hand below the waistband. "Hey, wait a second." 

"Then hurry up, Kurt," Blaine said, sitting up a little and taking note of the monitor. "Strip for me." 

Blaine's head tilted slightly to one side, his eyes never leaving his monitor, as he lightly touched himself. 

Kurt took a breath, then reached under his t-shirt, letting his hand skim his belly and chest, pausing to play with a nipple, then the other, before lifting the shirt over his head. He could already feel an ache in his groin, and finally reached down to address the tenting of his pajamas.

"C'mon Kurt. Don't tease me. I want to see you," Blaine whispered betweens soft moans. "Want to see all of you." 

Blaine was now palming himself in earnest, and Kurt couldn't wait any longer. 

"Together, Blaine. Ditch the pants." 

Blaine smiled a wicked smile, unzipped slowly and eased his jeans over his straining erection while Kurt mirrored the movement from his place on the bed. What he saw on the monitor brought him to an abrupt halt. 

"Oh my god. You went commando today," Kurt said, his voice a mix of pleasure, wonder and fashion shock. 

Blaine smiled to himself, then again directed his gaze straight into the webcam. 

"Just tonight, for you," Blaine said, thumbing at the pre-cum beading at the head of his cock. 

It was in that moment that it dawned on Kurt that Blaine Anderson had been a man with a plan. They may not have scheduled a  _Skype date_  for tonight, but that hasty text urging him on to his computer to chat for a few minutes was certainly about more than just catching up. 

Kurt kicked his pajama pants away and rolled to his side, facing his camera. The sight of Blaine, naked and stroking himself on his couch, left him gasping. He didn't need to catch up any more. 

Kurt reached down with both hands, rolling his balls with one and kneading the base of his cock with the other. He attempted slow, languid strokes, knowing that would make a better show for Blaine, but ultimately lost control. The pumping grew more fierce with each moan broadcast from his computer’s speakers. 

Blaine looked wrecked, lost in the moment. He ran a hand through his already-disheveled head of curls and with his other hand pulled, twisted and caressed his erection. He clearly didn’t have much time, so Kurt took it upon himself to put him over the edge. 

"Oh Blaine, miss you so much," he said, breathless. "Want you.  _Need_  you." 

Kurt's breathy words of encouragement were all Blaine needed. With a brief, muffled shout, he spilled over his hand and stomach, the throbbing of his penis clearly visible over the HD Skype feed. Kurt said a little thank you for high speed Internet connections before he began to feel heat building in his own abdomen. 

He pumped himself at an ever-increasing pace, knowing he had only moments left. A guttural moan built in his throat, and he looked up long enough to see Blaine, chest heaving and face flushed, staring at him. Kurt couldn’t hold back any longer, and felt an intensity in his release that left him just this side of stupid with pleasure. 

"Blaine, Blaine. Oh ... fuck .... 

“I love you. Love you so much.” 

**** 

Blaine logged off Skype and smirked with self-congratulatory pride. Kurt Hummel may often  zig when Blaine expected him to zag, but on some matters, Kurt was utterly predictable.  

And one of those included soft, well-worn blue jeans and a lack of underwear. 

He elicited exactly the response he was looking for. Not just the fact that they had just had one of their most intense Skype sessions ever -- and they had a few to choose from -- but because he thought he saw Kurt's walls begin to chip, just a little. 

Soon he would engage in full-on romantic assault in order to get those barriers to buckle and cave. 

Because Blaine Anderson was indeed a man with a plan, a plan that he knew had been brilliantly executed this evening. 

He dipped into the jar for a last finger-full of peanut butter and headed to the shower.


	6. Chapter 6

It won't be long before he commits the steep, dusty trail to muscle memory.

Each evening after work -- as long as there is still light left in the hillsides over Hollywood -- Blaine tosses on shorts and running shoes, and sets a blistering pace on the short, challenging circuit that is Runyon Canyon.

He doesn't necessarily go there for solitude. Runyon is a popular trek with locals and tourists alike. The trail is a magnet for fitness boot camps working up a sweat, dog walkers enjoying the lack of park leash laws and unprepared visitors hoping to enjoy the expansive city view and a possible celebrity sighting.

Occasionally, he hikes the longer, equally scenic Griffith Park Observatory trail. Sometimes, he joins the runners looping the Hollywood Reservoir. He even hiked the unmarked trail to the Hollywood Sign one day. 

But his go-to workout spot is Runyon. For Blaine, it has the unusual quality of being both a social hub and a place where despite the crowds, he can be completely alone with his thoughts.

He likes --  _needs --_  both.

There is a positive vibe to Runyon that’s undeniable: Runners huffing up the steeply carved steps to the peak, while hikers carefully maneuver downhill, signaling thumbs up to those headed uphill, or reassuring them that they’re “almost there.” It often feels like a supportive group effort, like summer camp, and Blaine loves it.

But he also usually goes it alone, and sometimes powers through the breathtaking climb  focusing solely on the precarious footing, knowing that it will clear his head. On those days, he may go extra laps, pulling off his T-shirt and tucking it into his shorts as he works up a shower-like sweat. 

It’s not just a workout. It’s therapy.

The Runyon hike has become an evening release, a workout that also has the effect of decompression. He dedicates himself to it in the hour approaching sunset on these long summer days. It's the perfect time for the outdoors this time of year: Early enough to take advantage of the last remnants of the day's sun, late enough to enjoy a cooling early evening breeze and pink and gold-tipped dusk sky.

He hadn't sought out a boxing gym as he had in New York. He didn't feel he had aggressions to work out, but he still wanted a  _workout._ Hiking fit the bill, and gave him the chance to spend time in his head, or outside it completely as he clambered up the rugged hillside.

The canyon was also conveniently located between work and home, and it became easier to find a parking space in the tightly packed rental neighborhood at its base after he bought a used Vespa for scooting around the city. Cooper had let him borrow his car, but Blaine only used it for occasional night events or the rare long drive to a place inconvenient for his Metro pass.

It’s Friday, and much of the office had already left to get a jump on the weekend. With the clock nudging toward 6 p.m., Blaine changed into his hiking gear and headed west to the base of the hills. He squeezed his scooter into a spot near the front gate, and stopped by the stand at the trailhead to buy a bottle of water, a banana and a postcard.

He would get to each of them when he reached the peak of the trail, the lookout spot with views of the Hollywood sign and a panorama of the city's three skylines: Downtown, Mid-Wilshire and the Westside.

Hikers generally took advantage of the benches installed on the peak to rest, drink water and take in the view. Blaine would usually charge through. Not today. 

This time, he shared a bench with a fit older woman taking a break with her energetic sheep dog, pulled the water bottle and banana from the deep left pocket of his cargo shorts, and a pen and the postcard from the other, then settled down for his weekly correspondence.

 

_Kurt,_

_Here's my workout regimen: I hike the hills, and make friends with the dogs and Cougars. As always, text when you get this._

_Love,_

_B_

There was so much more to say.

More than three weeks into Blaine’s relocation, and Kurt still wouldn’t give the slightest hint that he might be willing to visit, let alone have a conversation about the West Coast. If anything, he’d seemed to have dug in his Doc Maartens' heels on the issue.

Blaine had tried showing off the city, highlighting Kurt’s hot buttons: Celebrity, glamour and great desserts, all to no avail. He’d tried romance. He’d tried bribery. He’d tried the lure of sex.

Nothing.

For three weeks, he hinted, cajoled and flat-out begged Kurt to take time out to visit, but nothing. 

Kurt responded by telling him he was busy, which Blaine suspected wasn't entirely accurate, or by changing the subject. He bobbed and weaved like Blaine's old trainer at the boxing gym, and deftly maneuvered around the issue until the next time Blaine brought it up.

What’s worse, this was happening while Blaine was starting to feel connected to the city. He liked the pace, the sun, the casual veneer over the serious business of entertainment. It was beginning to dawn on him that it may be much more than a visit from Kurt that he wants.

It’s not that Blaine disliked New York. He enjoyed it. Correction. He enjoyed being with Kurt. Kurt, who was in New York. 

It dawned on him that it's the person, not the city, that made the home -- something he'd told Kurt long ago, over coffee at the Lima Bean, when Kurt first broached the subject of moving east.

It was in that moment that Blaine committed himself to treating his senior year in high school as a tactical strike, developing and carrying out a strategy that would land him at a university in New York in less than  a year.

Los Angeles was another story entirely. He headed west for himself, not for Kurt, and discovered that the city suited him. He liked its pace, which could range from lazy stroll to athletic run. No one seemed too concerned over which one you chose, either. 

While L.A. was a city of big business -- with entertainment at its heart -- it moved at a rhythm that felt more natural to Blaine than that of New York.

He liked being in a city where he could see the sky through the buildings. Sometimes, New York had a way of closing in on him. That's when he would head to Central Park, joining thousands of runners looking for their share of open space. In L.A., he could go to the beach. Or the mountains. Or the meandering hillside parkland that partially ringed the city core. 

He knew that he had begun to feel at home in California, but he also knew that he couldn't be home without Kurt.

****

Kurt,

I'd like you to meet a new friend. We often meet up on my hikes. His name is Max, and he's become very dear to me. 

Kurt's breath hitched as he clicked on the attachment.

It opened, and he found himself staring at large brown eyes, shaggy windswept hair and a tongue like an oversized shoe horn.

 

 

He was sitting on a ridge, overlooking the Hollywood sign, looking slightly winded and happy in a way only a dog can be. He was some kind of long-coated collie, a trail dog Blaine had befriended on one of his near-daily treks.

I don't think we've talked much about my hikes, other than the fact that they've replaced the gym for me, so I thought I'd share a little Runyon Canyon with you. Runyon is this open, rangy place, kind of tucked behind the Hollywood Bowl and peering over all the chaos of Hollywood Boulevard. It's another world up there.

A lot of people hike the Runyon Loop -- A LOT. Yet despite all the workout groups and dog walkers and tourists, it can be such a peaceful place. I love taking a break at the summit and just collecting my thoughts. You can sit up there and see everything, just everything: Mountains, ocean, the downtown skyline, the Observatory, the 747s landing at LAX. And all this sprawl is laid out in front of you, but you're seated on this serene, dusty hillside.

[Here’s](http://youtu.be/3MXU4d2w5VI) a video I found of another four-legged Runyon hiker’s adventures, so you can see what I’m talking about.

I was up there today, eating a snack and scratching Max's ears, and I started thinking about us. I know, I do that all the time. 

I want to share these things with you, Kurt, through more than just video. I want you to come visit me. It's an amazing city, and I think you'd enjoy it.

And there's this simple fact: I miss you. Please consider it. I know we can make this work 

With love,

B

P.S. What would you think about getting a dog?

 _****_  

"Amazing my ass," Kurt mumbled, shutting his laptop. " _New York_  is amazing. Los Angeles is ... sunny 350 days a year. Who needs that? 

"I see we're in a funk again?" said Rachel, who had recently formed a habit of stopping by for dinner, since Kurt's culinary skills were superior to her own. Left to her own devices, she would live on a diet of fruit smoothies and the salad bar at her nearest corner deli. She also knew that her longtime friend was lonely, and when Kurt got lonely, he got grumpy. They both had needs: Kurt needed someone to talk to. Rachel needed a real dinner.

The fact was, she couldn't stand seeing Kurt moping around the way he had the past few weeks, and in obvious denial of it. She also suspected that Blaine was in some form of conflict despite loving his summer job, and after an email exchange earlier that week, was certain of it. He was clearly enjoying Los Angeles, but just as clearly distraught that Kurt wouldn't even discuss a a visit west, even if he wouldn't say it in so many words.

"What's wrong with Blaine being happy with his summer job, Kurt? It's a  _great_  job. He's making contacts. He's learning the music industry. That's what you wanted for him. 

"What's wrong? Listen to him!" Kurt fired back. "He's like the little kid that sees something sparkly and say 'Oh, pretty!' He sees a shiny skyline and suddenly he's in love with Los Angeles."

"He sounds happy, Kurt. But he also sounds like he misses you."

Kurt huffed, clearing the table. 

Rachel followed behind him, rolling up her sleeves to tackle dishwashing duties.

"You could go see him. He obviously wants you to. 

"I'm too busy, Rachel."

"Can't you get off work? I thought it was quiet right now."

Kurt stared at her, incredulous. "Drop it, Rachel."

"Don't you  _want_  to see him?" Rachel asked, dropping her voice, suddenly recognizing the possibility that the situation may be a good deal more serious than she realized. 

_"Are you guys OK?"_

Kurt looked her dead in the eye and considered his possible responses.

"I don't know."

****

The fact of the matter was, not only did Kurt not know how they were doing, he hadn't even sorted out how he felt about Blaine's chirpy postcards, generally followed by a wistful letter.

It had left him off-balance.

Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't have hesitated to hop on the cheapest, most immediate flight available. He would visit at every possible opportunity. He missed Blaine. He missed their life, which had felt so settled just weeks before.

But nothing about this felt normal. And what Kurt needed right now was a little alone time. Time with his thoughts. Time away from anything that reminded him of the routine that they had established since moving in together.

No coffee shop on the corner. No walks in the park. No lottery line picnics.

He threw himself into the design prep he knew he would need for his final classes before graduation. Did it absolutely have to be done over the summer? No. But it never hurt to be ahead of the game, he convinced himself.

His life became a series of sketch pads, separated by seasons. Tailored military jackets  for fall. Flippy, pastel butterfly skirts for spring. 

He haunted fabric stores, looking for fine grade wool felt for an overcoat or silk charmeuse for a draped dress. But when he looked at his fabrics, it seemed that he had only been drawn to rich silk jacquards suitable for neckties, suiting of deep imperial blues and accent pieces in a bright crimson.

Exasperated, he recognized the subterfuge of his subconscious 

"Incredible. I'm making a fucking Dalton uniform."

The work did give him an excuse to be busy, too busy to travel, even if it wasn't the most honest of answers.

Because if he had answered Rachel honestly -- if he'd answered her at all -- he would have had to admit that he feared setting off a chain of events, a domino-effect that would leave Blaine 2,500 miles away once and for all.

Kurt worried that visiting the west coast would only reinforce Blaine's obvious growing attachment to the city, and validate his relocation, perhaps permanently. As far-fetched as it appeared on the surface, Kurt couldn't help but feel that the best way to guarantee Blaine's return to New York would be to ignore his requests to visit him in Los Angeles.

So he did his best to artfully dodge the question, change the subject or repeat mumbled affirmations of his  _impossible_  schedule. He knew it frustrated Blaine, but this was only temporary, he assured himself.

Nine weeks. That's all he needed. Then this would be over with and they could get on with their lives.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I' supposed to be adding a chapter a day, but I've missed a couple of days due to a chaotic schedule. Back on track now...


	7. Chapter 7

Susanna peered over the cubicle wall, giving Blaine the feeling that his teacher was hovering over his shoulder during a final exam. 

"Yes?"

 

"What are your plans this weekend? Continuing the postcard tour of L.A. for your man?"

 

Blaine shrugged. He'd been down since his last postcard to Kurt, conflicted over his developing connection to his new city and his feelings for the man who was going out of his way to avoid it. 

 

"Then you should join me in Laguna Saturday," she said. "I have tickets to the Pageant of the Masters. Why don't you come along? It may be just what you need."

 

Blaine had no idea what she was talking about, and gave her a furrowed brow of utter confusion.  _Masters?_   _Master Class? Masters of the universe?_

 

"Think of it this way. There's an orchestra, and makeup, and costumes and art," Susanna said. "Trust me. It's an institution -- and an excuse to drink margaritas in on a cliff overlooking the Pacific. C'mon, Blaine. Let's find you something to write about."

 

His grimace became a modest grin. He nodded, and finally agreed. What the hell. It was a chance to get out of the city completely and head down the coast for a while with the closest of his new circle of friends.

 

In his scant weeks at NSO, Blaine had quickly grown close to Susanna. She was becoming the big sister he'd never had. Much bigger. At 5'8", before heels, she towered over him in her Jimmy Choo's.

 

His job had him working closely with her, but they had also shared short lunch breaks and spent time bonding over stories about his brother and of her teenage son, who seemed to share an affinity for soccer, bad action flicks and leggy blondes.

 

Blaine was grateful for having made a friend he felt he could talk to at the office. Cooper had been fairly scarce lately, and Blaine found himself nudging closer and closer to the edge of loneliness.

 

For her part, Susanna had taken Blaine under her protective wing, helping him navigate office politics as well as Los Angeles traffic. She liked him, trusted him and was one of the few people in the office who didn't call him "kid."

 

_He's a young guy, but he's an old soul_ , Susanna thought to herself. 

 

And even though she had never seen him perform, she was certain that Blaine Anderson would leave his mark on this world, perhaps sooner than later.

 

_We've got to keep this guy in the NSO family._

 

****

 

Susanna's Audi S5 roadster careened down on the 405 at the "leisurely pace" of 85 mph on their way to Orange County. She insisted on driving with the roof down, or "going topless," as she liked to say, to Blaine's mild discomfort. The experience resulted in white knuckles and wildly unleashed curls.

 

"I haven't seen this side of you before," Blaine said, clutching the armrest. "And I've got to say ... I'm a little scared."

 

Susanna just laughed it off. "It's a Saturday afternoon and the freeways are open -- you've got to get it while you got it!" she shouted over the wind noise.  _She ought to join a Le Mans team_ , he thought to himself.

 

About an hour later, they were hurtling down Laguna Canyon Road, past art galleries and holistic veterinary clinics, toward the beach volleyball courts and fire pits on the soft sand of Laguna Beach.

 

When she could go no further, Susanna turned a quick right-and-left into the cliffside valet line at Las Brisas, a vivid white and blue coastal landmark known for enormous seafood platters, boozy  margaritas and, most critically, an unparalleled oceanfront view of the Orange County coastline.

 

They secured patio seats, ordered a Frutas de la Mer platter and Cadillac margaritas, then _mas_   _margaritas._

 

_"_ Someone's going to have to drive home, you know." 

 

"No worries, Blaine. There's always a driver on call for the office. Or there's the  _Surf and Sand_ if we're completely dysfunctional," pointing out the cliffside hotel a few blocks down PCH. "I promise not to try to take advantage of you," she added with a wink, laughing.

 

Blaine sighed, and chuckled uncomfortably.

 

Then she shifted gears as abruptly as she had navigating the winding canyon road. 

 

"So, tell me about the boyfriend. You haven't talked about him much."

 

She really only knew the sketchy details: A boyfriend a continent away with a promising future in fashion. Sharp wit. Spectacular hair. She wanted to know more: How they met, how they ended up in New York, where they would go from here.

 

Blaine had had just enough tequila to want to tell her.

 

He told her about his first moments after coming out, of a dance, a beating, a private refuge. About how an inept but beautiful spy for a rival high school show choir turned up at his school one day, and how his life changed for the better, hopefully forever. 

 

How he fell in love, for what he was certain was the one and only time, and transferred from the relative safety of a prestigious prep school to a backwater public school in order to follow his heart.

 

How he was left alone a year later, when he encouraged his boyfriend to chase his dream, and then set about the process of gaining acceptance into a New York music program like a military campaign in order to be reunited.

 

How he had scripted his life to fit into his boyfriend's narrative, and how he kept telling himself that it didn't matter. Until the day when it did, when he accepted the job at NSO, and took a step that put his own ambitions before those of the people he loved ... and how very conflicted it had left him.

 

"Tell me your best Kurt story," she said, sipping the frothy cocktail.

 

Blaine leaned back, supporting his head with his linked hands, stared into space momentarily and grinned. "Mmmm ... So many, but ... gotta be the museum."

 

"MOMA? The Guggenheim?"

 

"No," he said, laughing. "The Museum of Fine Neckwear and Foldable Clothes."

 

"Something tells me that's not one my concierge would normally recommend," Susanna said.

 

"Give it time," Blaine said, smiling broadly. He took a solid swig from his drink and then told her the story.

 

"We sublet my brother's apartment in New York, and it's fine for one person with a small wardrobe. But Kurt's hardly average when it comes to clothes. And when I moved in, it was just impossible.  _The ties alone_  ..." 

 

Laughing to himself, he recalled how on moving day, he was greeted with enthusiasm, then anxiety, as Kurt realized that the closet space was clearly not designed for two stylish young men with two very complete and very different wardrobes.

 

"This closet is the size of a refrigerator," Kurt complained. 

 

"Maybe we could set up a storage bar? I don't need to use the closet, Kurt. Besides, I mostly wear jeans and sweaters."

 

"And where are we going to put  _those_?" Kurt went on a rampage determining where and how to merge their wardrobes, only to change his mind again and again. 

 

"And your ties? Where are we going to hang the ties?"

 

Blaine remembered doing his best to stifle the laughter bubbling up from his gut, pressing his lips together tightly and looking off to a corner of the room. 

 

"What if I made them into wall art?" he said, intending it as a joke. "It could be like a museum collection of fine neckwear." Kurt's eyebrows shot up, and his blue eyes pierced straight through Blaine.

 

He immediately started doing laps around the tiny apartment, taking mental measurements as he went along.

 

"I was joking, Kurt. I can store some things. It's no big deal."

 

"No! You are not putting this collection in storage, Blaine Anderson. And you may have solved our little dilemma."

 

Before Blaine could say "home improvement," Kurt was headed to the Home Depot in the Flatiron District, a man on a mission. And Blaine learned long ago not to interrupt Kurt when he had his sights set on a goal.

 

"We could just buy some of those collapsable cubes," Blaine said, immediately regretting the suggestion as Kurt shot him  _The Look_. "Or not." 

 

He had dutifully followed Kurt around the store with a flatbed trolley as his boyfriend selected lumber, stain, sanding blocks and other supplies. Kurt rented a miter saw on his way out of the store. "Oh god, not power tools," he mumbled out of Kurt's ear shot in the checkout line.

 

Once back at the apartment with supplies unpacked, Kurt had shooed Blaine away, urging him to hit the practice room on campus, or see a movie, or go for a long walk. He had been deemed dead weight.

 

"He was typical Kurt. Determined, difficult. When Kurt really gets it in his head to do something, it's best just to get out of his way."

 

Susanna laughed, shaking her head. "How'd it turn out?"

 

"Gorgeous. Streamlined. Utilitarian.  _Bauhaus_. It's become something like a seasonal rotation of color in the bedroom, with the past season's colors shifted to the back. I just leave Kurt in charge. I'd ruin it."

 

"OK, now how about a bad Kurt story?"

 

Blaine went silent.

 

He squinted behind his RayBans, and turned to stared at the ocean.

 

"He won't come see me."

 

****

 

They walked two blocks up the canyon road to the amphitheater, arriving in time to grab a bottle of wine, listen to a jazz quintet and stroll through the booths of painters, sculptors, glass blowers and other artists in the open-air festival outside the theater.

 

At the far end of the fair, near the entrance to the amphitheater, they found the booth of a local jewelry maker. Her work featured swooping, modern hearts, some decorated with pearls or diamonds. Nearly all were centered with rough cut gem stones.

 

In the center of the display, a brooch caught Blaine's eye: A floating black heart of shimmering drusy quartz, surrounded by white gold, and tipped near the center with a solitary diamond.

 

"A black heart, eh?" Susanna said. 

 

"An unconventional heart," Blaine said. "But solid, and precious."

 

Blaine stared at it until the artist offered to pull it from the display. He held it gently, like he was cradling a baby bird.

 

"It's beautiful."

 

Then he turned it over and saw the price: $900. "Beautiful, for someone with a bigger budget."

 

Susanna cocked her head, studying Blaine's expression.

 

"Not on a student budget. Besides, there's other jewelry that comes first," he said, turning the heart in his hand, then giving it up, handing the brooch back to the jewelry-maker.

 

Susanna arched an eyebrow with exaggerated curiosity.

 

"That's always been the plan," Blaine said. "College, then married by 30."

 

"You make it sound like you're not sure whether it's still the plan," she said. 

 

Blaine huffed, gave no true response, then gazed back in the jewelers' case.

 

Tucked in the back of the display case was another pin. Another heart. One without diamonds or gemstones. Simple silver, a heart with an oxidized outline of a puzzle etched in its surface. Toward the center, the cut-out shape of a puzzle piece.

 

"My missing puzzle piece," Blaine half-spoke, half-sung under his breath. He looked at it for a moment. 

 

"Let's go find our seats."

 

****

 

"I'm  not quite sure what to expect here," Blaine said as they took their seats.

 

"If I tried to explain it, I'd screw it up and make it sound cheesy. So I'm just going to keep my mouth shut for now," said Susanna, nestling into her seat, drink in hand. "But take a look at the program."

 

The high gloss booklet almost looked more like a Sotheby's catalogue than an arts festival program. Deep inside, beyond the ads for Tiffany & Co. and Omega watches, was a series of illustrations from children's books, fine art depicting scenes from Shakespeare and J.M. Barrie and vintage magazine covers.

 

Further along were pages and pages listing community volunteers: Models, makeup artists, musicians, painters, designers and sculptors who donated their time and effort to the program.

 

Beyond that, more photos, this time of people in extravagant costumes and painted wigs, looking like exaggerated versions of the characters in some of the art works depicted in the front section of the program.

 

The orchestra cued up, and Blaine could see the first set pieces assembling on stage. The models positioned themselves as the narrator described the work -- illustrations from the original editions of  _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_  and  _Through the Looking Glass_. Their seats were close enough to see the models before the lights came up, and all Blaine could think was "clown make-up".

 

_What have I gotten myself into?_ he thought.

 

"I know what you're thinking," Susanna said, as if reading his mind. "Wait for it."

 

The narration completed, the lights were raised, and suddenly the stage went from oversized set pieces and exaggerated makeup to the books, come to oversized life. The volunteers models, posing as "Alice," remained utterly motionless for the minute or two that the lights were up on the artwork come-to-life. 

 

It was colorful, beautiful and like nothing he had ever seen before.

 

The theme centered on fairy tales, largely the recreation of art from children's books, but also works of fine art, sculpture, posters and even stained glass. All involved models as still as stone for the duration of the "reveal". Each time the lights shifted, it went from strangely over-the-top to breathtaking recreation.

 

"OK. That's pretty incredible," he whispered.

 

"See? It looks like it's going to be a little different this year. Fewer classicists, more theme. It normally ends with The Last Supper. They're kind of famous for it. But it looks like they're doing Dali's  _Last Sacrament of the Last Supper_  instead.  _There's_  a twist."

 

Sure enough, instead of the series of Vermeer, Homer and Rockwell that the Pageant was famous for, the stage lit up with art of Peter Pan, A Midsummers Night Dream and, much to Blaine's delight, covers from the 1920s science fiction periodicals, "Amazing Stories".

 

****

 

The evening fog rolled in by intermission, and Susanna wrapped her hands around her upper arms for warmth. Blaine, still the prep school gentleman, offered her the lightweight bomber jacket he'd brought along, just in case.

 

"I should have brought a sweater," she said. "I think I'll go grab some coffee. Want some?"

 

He'd pass. He had some quick work to do, but he decided to keep it short and sweet. He might elaborate later -- it was a terrific show -- but he worried that he'd laid it on a little thick in his earlier notes, and thought it might have alienate Kurt. This week, he'd keep it brief.

 

With Susanna on a mission for a hot drink and the amphitheater lights up, Blaine balanced the postcard he's bought at the festival shop on his lap and prepared his week's missive.

 

_Kurt,_

_Fairies, Alice & Peter Pan, all come to life. I've never seen anything quite like it. I'll send you the program._

_B_

 

****

 

The postcard arrived on Wednesday, and the change in tone and structure slapped at Kurt.

 

No "text me and I'll tell you more". No "I wish you could see this for yourself." 

 

No "love".

 

Kurt waited for the program, and told himself that he would never again complain about Blaine's affinity for letter writing.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter End Notes:  
> If you had never heard of the Pageant of the Masters, it's worth looking up. Really an incredible experience. The Festival described here is based on the 2011 festival, includingAlice's Adventures in Wonderland


	8. Chapter 8

A week had passed without a letter, an email or the package Blaine had mentioned in his last postcard. It was unlike him, and Kurt spent more time than was healthy wondering what might have happened.

Even the Skype dates had fallen off. The closest they had come to communicating was a series of hasty texts, most involving plans, then rescheduled plans, then canceled plans, to meet online.  

The end result was that for the first time since Blaine's departure, a week had gone by  where they had not spoken to each other. 

It was probably something as simple as a chaotic work schedule, but Blaine had found ways to work through that before. It could be that he was spending less time at home in the evenings. Like so many cities, Los Angeles was abuzz with events during the summer, so many of them linked to the music industry. 

But he suspected that it could also be that Blaine, so enthusiastic about postcards and letters and  _words_  such a short time ago, may be frustrated or even angry with him. And Kurt knew that an angry, frustrated Blaine often materialized as a silent Blaine. 

"It can't be this hard," Kurt muttered to himself, picking up his phone. Here it was, a Saturday night in New York City, and Kurt sat alone with his sketch pad, waiting and hoping for the phone to ring. 

 _Six_   _o'clock on a Saturday? He should be home._ Kurt thought, seemingly having a conversation with the sketched figure of his design.  

He grabbed his phone and opened the contacts app.  _Blaine_. 

**** 

The first sound on the other end of the phone was the huff, huff, huff of someone terribly out of breath. 

'Ugh. Hullo?' 

"Blaine? Are you OK?" 

"Kurt! Hey! Ugh ... The ringtone ... didn't ... register ... sorry." 

"Are you alright?" 

"Just got in the door ... early run ... about to jump in the shower." Blaine's voice and breathing gradually settled. With a last gusty breath, his voice returned to normal. "Whew. How are you?"  

"I'm fine. I just hadn't heard from you...." 

"I know. I'm sorry Kurt. It's just been so insane all week." 

"You never followed up your postcard last week. I never got your note." 

"Oh, the package. I've been meaning to mail it. It's right here." 

"Not the package, Blaine. I mean, I'm looking forward to seeing it and all, but you didn't write this week, at all. And I thought ... I expected ... " 

"I thought maybe you were tired of the notes." 

"Blaine, I wait for my note every week." 

"You like the letters?" 

"I  _love_  the letters. I love that you take the time to do that, that you do that for me. I may not always show it, but I love them, Blaine. I do." 

The phone went silent, briefly. Kurt could have sworn that he heard the familiar hitch of breath, little more than a tiny hiccup of air over the receiver. 

"OK," Blaine said, his soft voice full of forced casualness, but it was really the sound of relief.  

"I just miss you, and sometimes that doesn't come out right," Kurt said, "and now I've called just when you were getting ready to head out for the night." 

"Some friends from work were catching the movie at the cemetery movie and invited me along." 

 _"Excuse me?"_  

"They show movies outdoors at a cemetery on the weekends. It's a big thing -- picnics, a DJ, photo booth. It's a singalong  _Moulin Rouge_  tonight. So, um, yeah, I'm going to a party at the cemetery tonight." 

Kurt didn't know whether to be aghast about the whole 'party at the cemetery' idea or be concerned about who Blaine was sharing his picnic blanket with. He had always thought of Moulin Rouge as one of  _their_  movies, one of the handful of films that they would watch together with drinks and snacks, mainly as an excuse to spend two hours cuddled together. That he was going with friends, without him, just felt  _wrong_. He decided to put it out of his mind, a worry and discussion for another time. 

"I shouldn't keep you," he said instead. 

"Kurt, I promise to catch up. Tomorrow? Are you going to be around? We can Skype, and talk and just be together for awhile. I promise." 

"Sure," Kurt said, trying hard not to sound disappointed. "I'm around all afternoon." 

****

 

The line of picnickers snaked outside the gates of the Hollywood Forever Cemetery. Beyond their queue, cars lined up along Santa Monica Boulevard, waiting for the gates to open for the weekly event. 

Each summer Saturday, the aging cemetery hosted the film series to raise funds for its  upkeep. Located in an industrial neighborhood -- wedged between the Paramount Studios back lot and the local businesses that cater to it -- it was an odd oasis of ponds, trees and wide expanses of grass. It was the final resting place of some of the giants of old Hollywood, from studio boss Cecil B. DeMille to screen legend Rudolf Valentino and mobster Bugsy Siegel. 

The film series featured classics of both Hollywood's golden age and of recent pop culture. Each week, a couple of thousand fans would jostle for prime position to toss a blanket, set out a picnic and -- depending on how much liquor they had packed -- dance to the mix of a DJ who had set up a custom playlist based on the theme of the movie. 

Though the series, known as  _Cinespia_ , was well known both in and outside Hollywood, it largely attracted a crowd of locals and hipsters, of which Christian and his friends were both. 

He had urged Blaine to show up with his Vespa -- scooters, bicycles and motorcycles got first access to the grounds, which would be key to securing a central picnic spot. He had also been warned: Don't be fooled by the warm summer day. Bring a blanket, and a jacket. The cemetery can get cold at night. A little bottle of something wouldn't hurt warding off the chill, either. 

It ended up that they had plenty of bottles, and food, once Christian's friends showed up, ready for a casual night out in their Topman skinny chinos, Jack Spade T-shirts and classic Chuck Taylor Converse sneakers. Being casual didn't mean foregoing fashion, one of them explained. 

To Blaine, who lived with the embodiment of individualized fashion, the costly interpretation of "casual" didn't look much different than a Dalton suit: They dressed alike so that no one would risk standing out. 

The party of six nibbled on chicken and fruit and guzzled wine, beer and absinthe cocktails, sharing a bag of iced animal crackers with their neighbors. They danced -- in what little room they had on their blankets -- to the DJ's eclectic Moulin Rouge-inspired mix of David Bowie, P!nk, Tom Jones and Edith Piaf, among others. 

Blaine had to admit: What Christian's friends may have lacked in depth, they made up for in fun.  

**** 

Blaine had always loved  _Moulin Rouge_ : The color, the romance, the music -- the fact that he normally watched it under a blanket with Kurt snuggled into his shoulder. It was their go-to 'Let's suggle on the couch and watch a movie' movie. They'd sing along with the characters, Kurt a chanteuse and Blaine a penniless poet. It was a film that was engrained as an irrevocable part of their coupledom. 

As the movie began, he happily sung along with the crowd, earning nods of approval from Christian and his friends s he belted out  _Lady Marmalade_  and _Smells Like Teen Spirit_. But it wasn't long before Blaine realized that something just wasn't quite right. He stopped, listened for a moment to the laughter and the voices and the  _joy_  and realized that he was in the wrong place, at the wrong time, for all the wrong reasons. 

He excused himself, and delicately navigated the sea of picnic blankets, wine bottles and legs until he was free of the crowd at the periphery of the mausoleum lawn. He followed a winding cemetery road to a nearby lake and settled on a curb near Johnny Ramone's memorial, a lifelike statue of the New York punk rock icon, his guitar slung at hip level and eyes downcast. 

Blaine had no idea how long he'd sat in Johnny's evening shadow before a figure approached, wine bottle in one hand, jacket in another. 

"Well, what have we here?" Christian said, handing Blaine his jacket.   

"Thanks, but you didn't need to do that," Blaine said. The sound of hundreds of drunken voices singing  _Roxanne_  pierced the night. "You're missing the movie." 

"I've seen it before. What's wrong?" 

"I didn't want to spoil everyone's night. I probably shouldn't have come." Christian looked at him incredulously, but said nothing. "I have an attachment to this movie that  may not be healthy right now." 

Christian reached over and touched Blaine's forearm, stroking it lightly. "It's not easy being so far apart, is it? I swear it can destroy the most solid relationships." 

Blaine's flinch at the contact would have been almost imperceptible to anyone but himself. 

"I'm sorry Christian. I appreciate the invite and all, but I just need to be alone for awhile." 

Christian sat down on the curb next to Blaine and pulled the cork from the bottle. 

"I think you and I have a lot more in common than you realize," he said, haphazardly pouring the first glass. 

**** 

Blaine and Christian talked through the rest of the film, and through much of the DJ set that followed. Only when the cemetery was nearly cleared did Blaine say his goodbyes, grab the key to his scooter, zip up his jacket and prepare to leave. 

Then he felt it: The dulled point of a boxed corner hitting him in the upper hip bone. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out what appeared to be some sort of jeweler's box. 

Walking toward a street light, he opened it. Inside, a streamlined black drusy quartz heart, ringed by white gold and tipped with a solitary diamond.

 

 

**** 

"I can't accept this," Blaine said, nearly storming the reception bay Monday morning.  

"What? No 'Good morning, Susanna? Did you have a nice weekend?'," she said, hardly containing the grin creeping across her face. 

"I can't accept this." 

"Maybe I bought it for myself and forgot it in your pocket." 

"Either way, you're getting it back," Blaine said.  

"C'mere, Blaine. Follow me. Can't do this without caffeine," she said, pushing him forward by his shoulder and directing him to the elevators. "Cameron's out today. Starbucks, stat." 

He walked quietly, his head low, until they ordered her soy latte and his grande drip. They settled into two corner seats and Blaine leaned in to make his case. He was promptly stopped by an upheld palm, Susanna stopping him until she'd had her first sips of morning coffee. 

"I know what you're going to say. It's sweet. Really, it is, Blaine, but I'm not changing my mind. I saw how you looked at it -- like that pendant wasn't going to be complete until it was relocated to Kurt's lapel." 

"It doesn't matter," Blaine said. "I just can't." 

"If you won't accept it, then what am I going to do with this?" she said, pulling a second jewelry box from her Coach bag. 

Blaine gave her a resigned 'now what?' look, then reached for the box. 

"If you won't take that black heart, then will you at least consider this?" 

Blaine opened the box: The missing puzzle piece brooch. He stared at it for a moment, thumbed over its surface. Then he looked up at Susanna, tears forming in his eyes. 

"Oh, honey. That was the right one, wasn't it?" she said softly, reaching out to take his hand in hers. 

Blaine could only nod. 

"I'll make you a deal. I'll keep the drusy heart, because, to be honest, I think it's  _gorgeous_  and I'm delighted to have an excuse to keep it. You take the silver heart and send it to your man." 

"I can't really afford this either," Blaine said. While the puzzle heart was considerably less expensive that the stone, gold and diamond brooch, it was still well outside his budget. 

"I don't care, Blaine. Consider it my investment in your happiness." 

He looked up to her, tears in his eyes, and nodded. "I'm paying you back. Some day."

 "You don't have to," she said, "But if that's what  you need, then it's a deal. Pay me back -- some day. 

"Would you tell me one thing," she added. "What's the significance? Is there something more to it than the missing piece of your heart?" 

"Yeah ... there is, but it's going to sound a little...." Blaine rolled his eyes, and tried again. "Remember how I told you about how Kurt and I met? That day at Dalton? The Warblers were about to perform, and I led Kurt to the commons so he could watch. The song ... kind of became our thing." 

"And that was?" 

"... I finally found you, my missing puzzle piece ..." Blaine sang quietly. 

If the coffee hadn't sharpened Susanna's senses, the song did. She beamed. 

"Teenage Dream -- it's your song?" 

"Kurt wouldn't be caught dead calling a Katy Perry song  _our song_ , but it is. It's how we met. It stuck." He shrugged. 

"I think it's lovely," Susanna said. "It's sweet. And this?" she said, holding the hand where he held the puzzle heart, "is perfect." 

**** 

Kurt came home Tuesday to a delivery notice. He had just enough time to pick the package up at the FedEx store a few blocks away before closing time. He signed for the box, and rushed home to open it. 

Inside, a letter, the envelope marked "Read Me First" in tidy Sharpie letters. Then another box, small and wrapped in simple brown paper and a raffia bow. One last piece of paper rattled around in the shipping container. A program, a flyer, from the singalong  _Moulin Rouge._

 

 

Dear Kurt, 

I usually do this by email, and I usually send a postcard. But a funny thing about cemeteries -- postcards aren't big sellers. For Cinespia, there is no gift shop at all. So I thought I'd send you a letter -- a real, authentic, genuine, written-on-paper letter. Sent overnight. 

So I'm mailing you this flyer to show that, yes, they do show movies in the cemetery. No, you do not picnic on the graves. It's a big, open grassy area outside the mausoleum, and the cemetery's very careful to keep people off the graves. Yes, it's fun. Tombstones and potential for creepy ghost stories aside, it's the sort of thing I think you'd really enjoy. There's music, and food and a lot of quality people-watching. 

And I know I've said this a lot -- maybe so much that you're starting to tune it out -- but I wish you'd been there.  _Moulin Rouge,_  Kurt.  _Sing-along Moulin Rouge._ Imagine the a couple of thousand people sprawled around a park, eating, drinking, dancing and singing along to  _Moulin Rouge._ This is what good times are made of, right? 

The problem was, I got part-way through the movie and I just couldn't anymore. I don't know how many times we've watched it together, but no matter what the environment, no matter how great the picnic or how good the DJ was, no matter how good the company was, I just couldn't. I went and sat in the graves, Kurt. Talk about symbolism. I sat there at the Johnny Ramone memorial and listened to everyone sing and thought how wonderful it would have been if it had just been you and me, how this was a perfect night for us and how you haven't even really been willing to talk about even visiting me here ... and it hurt, Kurt. 

And I know it's not all your fault. 

The past week or two has been difficult. When I'm with you, it's like everything's in balance. But the more I see, the more I do, I'm just reminded that I'm not doing it with you, and it just doesn't feel right. It isn't complete. 

I should have had a great time at that movie last night. Great food. Great company. Great movie. Great surrounding. 

And I hated it.  

It's time for me to dig myself out of this hole. I came here to build a better future for      myself and for us, and that's what I intend to do. I may never feel complete without you, but I also know that I'll never  _be_  complete if I don't do this for myself. 

So I'm going to keep going. I'm going to finish this, no matter how much I may miss you. And maybe I should stop asking you to come see me, but I'm not going to stop doing that, either. I'm going to write, and I'm going to hope and I'm going to keep missing you, but I'm not going to stop. 

Because I'll never be complete without you, Kurt.  

With all my heart, 

B

  

Feeling a little shell-shocked, Kurt picked up the neatly-wrapped box. He pulled at the raffia, peeled off the tape and worked the box from its brown-paper womb. A jeweler's box.  

Uncertain about Blaine's mixed signals, he opened it. 

Inside, a silver jigsaw puzzle heart, missing its central piece.

 


	9. Chapter 9

"Time for a road trip, tadpole."  
  
"Quit calling me that, Coop. I'm not a little kid any more. And you were just on the road."  
  
"Doesn't mean I can't do it all over again."  
  
Cooper Anderson had been home little more than two days, and already he was itching to be somewhere else. As a concept, Blaine would never understand why someone would be so anxious to be away from home. But having witnessed a lifetime of his brother's wanderlust, it made perfect sense in the context of Cooper Hubble Anderson.  
  
Blaine was scarcely home from his evening hike when Cooper started dropping hints that he had plans for his little brother. Two hours later, after bouncing from living room to kitchen to  _wherever Blaine was at the moment_ , Cooper had yet to take the hint that not only did Blaine consider himself too busy for his brother's shenanigans, but he was also perfectly happy staying close to home.  
  
"I can't just go wandering off. I have a job, Coop."  
  
"So do I, usually."  
  
"A 9-5 job. Sometimes, a 9-to-midnight or beyond job. I can't go on a road trip."  
  
"A mini-road trip then. San Diego, for the weekend. Beaches. Blondes. Clubs. Blondes. The zoo.  _Blondes._ "  
  
"I think I got, it, Coop. Lots of things to do."  
  
"We'll head down there as soon as you're done with work Friday, back home at a reasonable hour on Sunday. Time for a little brotherly bonding. OK?"  
  
Blaine looked at him suspiciously. There were a dozen other things he could or even should be doing. He should be online with Juilliard, planning the few remaining segments of his college career. He should be spending more time with a keyboard or his guitar, because he was falling behind on practice hours since moving to L.A. He should be spending time online with Kurt, and hold true to his vow that he would remain positive -- and persistent -- in seeing him before the end of summer.  
  
Instead, he caved, as he often did to his influential older brother.   
  
****  
Cooper knew that Blaine saw him as basically clueless and whim-driven, but he was more in tune with his brother's habits, body language and verbal cues than Blaine had ever given him much credit for.  
  
He knew that while Blaine's painful history ultimately resulted in his transformation into a physically strong man, it also resulted in a carefully hidden thread of emotional vulnerability.  
  
He had followed Blaine's infrequent Facebook posts and noticed a change in tone, always a sign that something was amiss with his little brother. He'd noticed that responses to his text messages with increasingly short, and sometimes terse. It took less than five minutes through the door for him to notice Blaine's slumped posture, dull eyes and and quiet demeanor.   
  
 _He either screwed up an exam or there's trouble in paradise -- and he's not in school right now._  
  
Cooper knew full well that the ease that Blaine carried himself with in public -- the relaxed smiles, the childlike enthusiasm -- was often little more than a ruse. The moment the crowds dispersed, or the class was over, when Blaine felt safe to let down his guard, he could coil into himself in retreat. Cooper, despite being gone for much of Blaine's life, knew this almost intuitively. He saw the signs when he walked through the door two days ago, and this weekend, he intended to get to the bottom of it.  
  
****  
  
They arrived at their downtown hotel at a time that Cooper considered absolutely perfect for the start of a late-night bar crawl through the Gaslamp Quarter.  
  
Blaine considered it an equally perfect time to go to sleep, and quickly flopped on to his bed and grabbed the remote control.  
  
Cooper unpacked, changed and refreshed to make sure that his dark hair looked meticulously unkept. He was ready to hit some clubs, and he wasn't taking no for an answer.  
  
"Do you know how many bands are playing right now, right out there?" he said, pointing out the window. "It's Friday, and the night's just getting started. I promise you, whatever you're in the mood for is out there."  
  
"I'm in the mood for sleep," Blaine said, flicking on the TV.   
  
"What happened to the guy who wanted to see everything? Experience everything?"  
  
"He saw it. Now he wants to sleep."  
  
"Not happening, lil bro. You haven't been here before and I would be derelict in my brotherly duties if I didn't introduce you to San Diego's nightlife," Cooper said, committed to his argument. "Besides, I need a wingman."  
  
"Coop ..." Blaine whined in protest.  
  
"No go, lil bro. Get changed."  
  
Blaine rolled his eyes and peeled himself off the mattress with exaggerated labor. Just to annoy Cooper, he took his own sweet time getting changed into a pair of slim-fit Levis and a striped polo. With a 'you win' smirk, he declared himself fit for duty.  
  
****  
  
A late night became an early morning, but Blaine couldn't find it in himself to sleep past 9, not when his stomach was growling like an old muscle car. Cooper was passed out cold on his bed, and Blaine knew it could be hours before his brother was mobile.  
  
"Screw it. I'm hungry," he said, heading out the door and to the nearest diner. On his way, he passed trendy shops full of kitschy souvenirs. Near the front of one store: A rack of postcard recreations of old time historic photos of San Diego.   
  
Breakfast could wait a few minutes. He found just the right one, and wrote a quick note over coffee.

  
  
 _Did you know San Diego has the Largest Outdoor Organ In The World? That's information worth knowing, Kurt.  ( :_  
  
 _Love,  
  
B_  
  
****  
  
Once Cooper managed to open his eyes, he became a blur of energy, and outlined a day of activities he'd planned.  
  
Blaine would have been content to spend the day by the pool, but Cooper insisted. They would go see the pandas at the zoo, then stroll through the Balboa Park museums ( _"There's a torture exhibit at the Museum of Man!" he said with inexplicable enthusiasm._ ), then hurry back to the hotel to get cleaned up before seeing a new play at the Old Globe Theatre. A director that Cooper hoped to work with was directing, and he had purchased tickets in hopes of meeting and cornering him for a few minutes.  
  
Over the course of the day, Cooper stuck to light, jokey topics: The constant state of 74-degree weather in San Diego ( _"It's an urban legend," he said. "Sometimes it's 75."_ ), the Buckeyes' prospects for the coming college football season, the possibility of bridging from television to film or even stage to up his credibility as a "serious" actor.  
  
He eventually made his way to what he really wanted to talk about: Blaine's well-being and his plans for the future.  
  
Blaine would give him a non-committal answer. "Finish Juilliard. Write music. Perform." Nothing telling, nothing Cooper didn't already know. Nothing about Kurt.  
  
He would try again on Sunday morning, when he took Blaine to brunch at the Hotel del Coronado, a historic beachside resort that had hosted presidents, rock stars and Marilyn Monroe during the filming of  _Some Like It Hot_.  
  
Its Sunday brunch was a lavish institution for locals and tourists alike, spanning a oceanfront rotunda with displays of seafood, carving stations and elaborately constructed desserts, not to mention waiters serving as many margaritas as champagne cocktails.  
  
As the second round of drinks hit the table -- a Bellini for Blaine, a Bloody Mary for Cooper, the older brother decided to make another pass at trying to unlock whatever his younger sibling was keeping carefully sealed inside.  
  
"You're a little quieter than usual," Cooper said. "Getting a little homesick?"  
  
"Define 'home'," Blaine responded cryptically. "Fine. I know what you're getting at. I know I haven't been exactly myself the lately, and I keep going over and over why that is. And I've come to the conclusion that it's because ... I'm happy here."  
  
"You're making absolutely no sense, Blaine."  
  
"I'm happy here in California, and that's a problem because I have a life in New York."  
  
"And a Kurt."  
  
"Yes, and a Kurt. That's my problem, and, I think, Kurt's."  
  
Blaine finally opened up, telling Cooper about shutting down around Kurt, about the letters, about spending half the previous Saturday night pouring his heart out to another man he barely knew. About guilt, and need, and responsibility.   
  
"And I think Kurt's just as confused as I am."  
  
"Why's that?"  
  
"I shut him out for two weeks. We hardly spoke. Then I sent him my heart."  
  
"Once again Blaine,  _not_ making sense."  
  
"A brooch, a pin. From an artist in Laguna. It was a heart. I'm pretty sure that gave him whiplash."  
  
"And you?"  
  
"Me too, a little, I guess. We've been apart before, for nearly a year, and it wasn't nearly as hard as this. We had a couple of rough patches, but nothing like this. I think it's because we both knew we were going to end up together at the end of it. We had a plan. And I keep telling him this is temporary, that it's an opportunity. I tell him that I'm coming home, but I don't think he believes it. And lately, there are times when I don't believe it, either.   
  
"It's a good fit for me here, Coop. I feel like I've been given a chance to earn something on my own and I've just never felt that before.  
  
"I've been trying to convince him to come out here, even if it's just for a weekend, just to see it. He just wants nothing to do with it. I didn't think it would be so hard to get him to visit me, but he won't even discuss it."  
  
Cooper sat quietly for a moment, then chuckled to himself. Blaine neither expected or wanted that reaction and simply glared.  
  
"Did you ever consider that he's just worried about losing you?" Cooper said. "He's got a life, too, Blaine -- and it's in New York. What happens to him if you stay here? Maybe he thinks that staying there will bring you back to him sooner.    
  
"Do you love him?"  
  
"Of course."  
  
"You want a future with him?"  
  
"Always."  
  
"Maybe he needs to know that he can have the same future here that he has in New York, or that you two have a future in New York, or wherever. Whatever it is, maybe you need to reassure him of that."  
  
"I moved to New York for him."  
  
"Years ago, Blaine -- where you were able to pursue your interests as well as your heart. What about Kurt?"  
  
Blaine look down at the table, the through the windows toward the beach, then over to the guitarist in the corner -- anywhere but across the table to his brother.  
  
"Shit, Cooper. You're right."  
  
"Of course."  
  
"... for a change. When did you become a relationship guru?"  
  
"Just because I don't apply these magical skills for myself doesn't mean I can't use them for the greater good."  
  
Blaine cracked the biggest grin that Cooper had seen all weekend, and flagged the waiter for another Bellini.  
  
"And people think  _you're_  the smart brother," Cooper muttered.  
  
****  
  
Kurt could feel his pulse double-time when he pulled the card out of the mailbox.  _Back to normal_ , he thought with relief. Already an old habit, he pulled his phone from his jacket pocket and sent Blaine a text before he'd even made it to the front door.  
  
 _Largest Outdoor Organ? Please, fill me in. ( ;_  
  
He looked at the text.  _That'll get his attention_ , he thought, smiling to himself. He was  satisfied that they seemed to be on the right track again. Blaine's postcard signaled that he might be out of his funk, playful and flirtatious once again.  
  
Within moments, his phone rang. Kurt didn't even make time for 'Hello'.  
  
"Do you have WiFi? Switch over to FaceTime," he said.  
  
"Hmmm?"  
  
"I want to show you something."  
  
Blaine switched over to the video conference app and looked into the screen on his phone. Eventually, a figure appeared. Kurt was smoothing down the collar on his jacket, stopping to touch something.   
  
He pulled his hand away to reveal the silver jigsaw puzzle heart. Blaine beamed. "You're wearing it!"  
  
"I was going to wear it on my sleeve, but ..."  
  
"I wasn't sure you'd like it," Blaine said, sounding sheepish.  
  
"Of course I like it. I  _love_  it. I'm wearing it every day --  _and you know I never do that_ ," Kurt said, touching his collar and making an imperceptible adjustment to the heart, just as he had a thousand times that day.  
  
"I told you I love it, and I do, Blaine. ... I love you."  
  
"I love you, too, even if I have odd ways of showing it sometimes. I was never good at romance."  
  
"You  _ooze_  romance. You do unexpected things, unexpected romantic things. How many people get weekly love letters from their boyfriends? How many people can say that their partner's still trying to sweep them off their feet years after they met? How many, Blaine? Because I can say that, and I treasure it."  
  
Kurt paused, looking straight into the grainy image of his boyfriend with the earnest expression of someone trying to make a life-altering point.  
  
"Just don't serenade me in a Gap store."  
  
Blaine laughed, then face-palmed, and laughed some more, more than he had in weeks.  
  
"Just when I thought you were going soft on me," he said.  
  
"One thing I can promise," Kurt said in an exaggerated stage whisper. "I'll  _never_  go soft on you."  
  
Blaine's eyebrows shot up, and he raised his hand to his mouth. "Kurt!" he said a little too loud, then quickly lowered his voice. "Um, as much as I appreciate it, I'm sitting in a coffee shop right now and I think the next table over just heard that."  
  
"Then I'm just getting started ..."  
  
"Oh no you don't, not unless I can be an active and very vocal participant.  How about tonight? Skype?"  
  
"If I must, but I'm kind of enjoying this, Blaine."  
  
"That's exactly what I'm worried about," Blaine said, a hint of a blush creeping across his face. "Eight o'clock? In the mean time, I haven't forgotten your letter."  
  
"I was starting to wonder. I usually get an email after the postcard. Today I got a call -- not that I'm complaining."  
  
"You'll have it soon enough. Every gory detail of my brotherly bonding weekend -- and why I'm convinced Cooper will be the death of me. I just wanted to hear your voice."  
  
"And you got to see me ..."  
  
"And I got to see you. Eight o'clock, my time. Now check your email."  
  
****  
  
TO: Kurt Hummel  
FROM: Blaine Anderson   
RE: Of enormous organs and Shakespeare in the park  
  
Before he could go any further, Kurt went to pour himself a drink. He was going to  take the time to savor this.


	10. Chapter 10

 

 _Lovely, isn't it?_   _It makes me wish I'd packed a suit._  

 _Thinking of you,_  

_B_

 

Kurt recognized the stainless steel cladding of the Disney Concert Hall on the postcard instantly, and assumed that Blaine was involved in an event where his sport coat wouldn't quite pass muster. 

His response was instantaneous. 

 _Do you want me to ship a suit to you? If you have time, I can pull something new together. I can work from some of the slacks you left behind, or we can find you someone local to hem them._  

Don't worry, Kurt. I've got it all taken care of. New suit vetted, selected, negotiated and purchased! I should have it this afternoon. I'll send you a pic, and the story. Watch your email. 

Kurt was delighted that Blaine wasn't in the midst of a fashion emergency, but he did have this tiny, bitter aftertaste from the message. He had always been Blaine's de facto fashion consultant since he ditched the uniform of Dalton Academy for the street clothes of a boy who had little interest in looking street.  

Not that Blaine needed a lot of help. He had his own style, and that was half of fashion. It was certainly more conservative than what came naturally to Kurt, but it was without doubt very Blaine. He could be old and gray and still pull off a hybrid of prep school/Tom Ford chic. Kurt mainly just liked to fine tune it a bit and Blaine, much to Kurt's delight, was receptive. 

He was just... surprised... that Blaine would buy a suit without consulting with him. With a little notice, he would have designed and constructed one for him, without hesitation. He had Blaine's proportions committed to memory, and had a wall full of clothes to use as measurement guides even if his memory of Blaine's shoulders, neck, waist, hip and inseam measurements failed him. And that would not happen, he knew.

**** 

The photo, and his letter, arrived that evening. Kurt was scrolling Vogue on line when his laptop email notification dinged. He normally wouldn't rush to check each email signal, but he knew what he was expecting and if he had to tell the truth, he was anxiously waiting to find out why Blaine suddenly found himself in need of finer threads.

 

Subject: _Runway ready?_  

Kurt opened the attachments first, his curiosity about fashion choices outweighing his desire to read Blaine's latest soliloquy. 

Two photos -- one head-on, the other angled from the back -- took Kurt's breath away. Blaine, more tan than the webcam had let on,  _did_  look like he belonged on a runway. 

The suit was edgier than what Kurt was accustomed to seeing on him. Surprisingly so. It was also on trend: A soft heather gray slim cut with dark gray lapel inserts; fitted lines tracing Blaine's lean frame; a short-cut jacket that skimmed his lovely hip bones and revealed slacks that contoured his ass in the most intentional of ways. He added color with a trim, violet dress shirt and pocket square, finished off with a charcoal silk neck tie, slightly narrow to fit the lines of the jacket. 

"My god," Kurt said aloud, a little dazed. 

There was no way that Blaine chose this suit for himself. It was the suit that Kurt would have steered him to -- if Blaine would have allowed it.  

But he had to admit -- Blaine really wore that suit.

  

Hello love, 

What do you think? Did I do alright without my favorite fashion consultant at my side? I can't remember the last time I did something like this without you. 

I was about to have you send one out to me, but a friend at the office has contacts in the local menswear industry, and offered to help me out. I was a little worried we'd end up somewhere beyond my budget -- you would appreciate Christian's sense of style, Kurt. I'm just not sure I could afford it right now. Instead, we ended up in showrooms in the downtown fashion district. Just like New York, Kurt! I had no idea. 

 _Christian. Cemetery guy,_ Kurt thought. Pangs of jealousy, suspicion, longing and maybe a little anger shot through him before he could continue reading. _Control, Kurt. It's just shopping_.  _Let it go._  

I have a couple of events -- a wedding, a benefit at the Disney Concert Hall -- that are going to be a bit dressier than my sport coat could manage. I probably should have planned better, but I have to admit, I like my new suit -- even if it's not a Kurt Hummel original. I also bought additional accessories to mix it up. Never say I haven't watched, listened and learned from my Jedi Fashion Master.  

Kurt rolled his eyes.  _Yes, padawan, you have learned well._  

Christian was so helpful. He took me to the Fashion District and helped me pick out the suit (and got me a good deal from one of his friends). 

"I bet he did," Kurt said under his breath. He didn't know what this guy looked like, but he had a vision in his head of exactly what Christian-the-Californian looked like. Kurt envisioned a surfer gone to business school, with wavy golden hair, a tan and fit body, bright blue eyes and an sexy smile straight out of a tooth whitener ad. 

I got the whirlwind tour of downtown L.A. It's an eclectic place, in some ways a lot like Manhattan -- how the character of the neighborhood can change from block to block. The Fashion District was a lot like in New York -- fabric everywhere, and showrooms tucked away in a bunch of industrial buildings at the corner of downtown.  

We would walk along a street of newly-renovated historic buildings being converted to lofts and cafes, then turn on to a street  taquerias, immigration offices, and wedding chapels. I discovered you can also buy purple hoop skirts and accordions -- in the same store. Turn another street, and you're at the Music Center. 

Christian called ahead to the Disney Hall -- he has a friend who handles PR for the L.A. Philharmonic -- and we got a behind-the-scenes tour and got to watch part of a rehearsal. The exterior's iconic, of course, but the inside is beautiful, Kurt. You would appreciate the design. And the acoustics! Wow. Just wow. 

"Wow, indeed." 

We could have had lunch at Patina while we were at the Music Center, but instead we walked over to Grand Central Market, an old institution in the city with fruit and vegetable stands, meat and seafood vendors, cheese shops and even bakeries in one spot. We picked up some fruit, and then ate at -- don't turn up your nose -- at a food truck. 

Gourmet food trucks are everywhere in this city, and the Kogi truck had parked outside the market, so I got my first taste of Korean BBQ tacos. _They're delicious!_  

"You're not going to fit in that suit very long if you keep that up," Kurt muttered. Then Blaine took an abrupt turn, and reminded Kurt why he had been left so off-balance after his last letter. 

I know it's been busy lately, but I hope you'll consider what I said before. We do need to talk, Kurt. Not just on the phone, or online, but face-to-face. Don't you want to be together again? There's so much to discuss, and some conversations need to be face-to-face. It's important to me, just as you are. 

I do love you. So much. And I want the best for us both. 

With all my heart, 

B

 

Those final sentences didn't feel like the early hard-sell letters Blaine had sent, extolling the virtues of the West Coast. They felt urgent, serious. It felt like something Kurt wanted to keep at arm's length. 

He reopened his web browser, and starting looking up places and moments that had been important enough to Blaine for him to write about. He really hadn't bothered before, living off of Blaine's descriptions, postcards and emailed photos. Hollywood Bowl. Pageant of the Masters. Cinespia. The El Rey. Runyon Canyon. The Old Globe.  

Blaine was right. If it hadn't been for the fact that they were a few thousand miles away, they would have been  _exactly_  the kinds of things Kurt would be drawn to. 

Against his better judgement, he thought about the search results he  _really_  wanted. If he only had Christian's last name. Then a thought, and he tapped the key words into the search bar: Christian, NSO, LGBT, Hollywood. Snippets from clippings gradually appeared, from society sections, newsletters, the entertainment pages. Facebook. Twitter. All involved in music, fashion, LGBT and charitable events in the Los Angeles area.  

 _Christian Mayas, assistant to NSO Chief Financial Officer ..._  

He clicked on the Images tab, and held his breath.  

 _Shit_. 

Not a blonde beach boy. But a lot like an Abercrombie and Fitch model. Brown hair, an olive complexion and dark eyes that read  _Mediterranean_. Newspaper photos of Christian Mayas at black tie fundraisers. Promotional pictures of Christian Mayas in box seats at the Hollywood Bowl. A Cinespia web site photo of Christian Mayas at a picnic ...  _Is that Blaine?_  

Half of his brain was churning to see Blaine posing happily with  _Adonis_  at the Moulin Rouge screening. The other half was thinking  _that should be me._  

 _If you'd just gone out there like he'd asked, that would have been you in that picture._  

He snapped his laptop shut and decided to get ready for bed. 

 _Just a few more weeks_ , he told himself. 


	11. Chapter 11

"Hello? Kurt?"

The first words in his ear were of shear panic. 

"It's gone, Blaine. IT'S GONE."

"What's wrong, sweetheart? Slow down. Tell me what happened."

"It flew away. I couldn't catch it. Now it's gone."

"Shh. Shhhh," Blaine hushed him gently, hoping to calm Kurt down at least long enough to find out what had happened. "It's OK, Kurt. It's OK, whatever it is. What flew away?"

"Your ring. My ring. Our promise ring," he said, sobbing.

Kurt composed himself long enough to tell Blaine about the current heatwave, and the apartment's lack of air circulation, and how he had opened the windows in the bedroom and living area to try to create a cross-current in their stifling apartment.

For hours, it had little impact. Kurt had been cleaning the apartment when he stopped and opened the ring box containing his most treasured possession: The gum wrapper    promise ring Blaine had made for him for their first Christmas together. The ring with the little red paper bow tie to remind him of the boy who promised to always love him.

Kurt set the ring down on the dresser to answer the phone, just when the breeze he had hoped for hours earlier appeared at the most inopportune time.

He looked over just as the wind picked the ring up and carried it out the window.

He rushed to it, only to see the ring disappear westward in the late afternoon sun.

"I couldn't chase it, Blaine. It was gone too fast; I couldn't catch it. I tried to find it. I followed its path, I looked for hours, but I couldn't find it. It's gone for good."

The words tugged at Blaine's heart. That a little gum wrapper ring could mean so much, so long after he manipulated all those Juicy Fruit papers into a token of his devotion. He smiled to himself.

"Kurt, it's alright," Blaine said, trying to console him. "It was paper, just gum wrappers. Paper never lasts forever. It was going to fall apart someday. I can make you a new one."

"But I don't want a new one. You can never replace an original, Blaine."

"Kurt, maybe it's time for a different ring."

He was met with silence.

"Kurt?"

"What are you talking about, Blaine?"

Blaine paused. This wasn't a good time for the marriage conversation, not while he was sitting in an L.A. bar. Not with Kurt steadfastly refusing to leave New York, even for a weekend. He wanted to have the conversation, but he felt they had things to work out first.

"I'll make you a new ring, Kurt. This doesn't change anything. It's OK. It's not your fault. Everything's going to be OK."

His sobs now muffled to sniffles, Kurt heard the clatter, music and voices of a crowd in the background.

"Where are you anyway?"

"There's a little party for one of my co-workers tonight. Just out for drinks and dinner, but   the volume's definitely picking up."

"And where do they have you tonight? A chic little club? A trendy new restaurant?"

"No, it's kind of an older place, but it's really popular."

"And where's that, Blaine?" Kurt asked again, now sensing a little avoidance. And while Blaine was good at many, many things, the evasive arts were not in his wheelhouse. He had never been a good liar, so he never really tried. 

It's not that he was honest to a fault. He was honest out of necessity, and it had become his nature. If there was something he wanted to hide, he would usually simply stop speaking, or try -- awkwardly -- to change the subject. Kurt actually considered this one of Blaine's finer qualities, as well as his greatest  _tell_.

"Um, we're over in West Hollywood. You know, restaurant central!"

"Yes, there are all kinds of bars over there, aren't there? Which one did you settle on tonight?"

All Kurt heard was laughter, music and the clinking of glasses.

"Blaine?"

"Kurt?"

"Yes?"

"I know you're not going to like this ..."

"Yes?"

"... but it was a group thing and I really have no influence over that and ..."

"Blaine?" Kurt prompted, though he already knew the answer.

Blaine looked around the bar, the dim lighting in the private cubby where he was celebrating with friends. Really, it was harmless. On one side, the room led to a restaurant, and a dining patio that resembled a lush Mediterranean villa. To the other side of  the bar, and open room, at its center a dance floor that in a few hours would be crowded with bodies and the thumping beats of disco standards mixed with a DJ's techno mash-ups. But Kurt had made it clear early on that he was uncomfortable with him visiting a gay bar in his absence. He drew a breath, anticipating the inevitable response.

"We're at The Abbey."

Kurt absorbed it for a moment, and tried to take time to collect himself before speaking. It didn't work.

"I thought we talked about this, Blaine."

"Kurt, it's a party for ..."

"I don't care who or what it's for. We talked about this. You knew how I felt. You went anyway."

"But Kurt, it's an ..."

"Let me guess. You were going to send me a postcard telling me all about it? Maybe a letter telling me all about how much fun I would have had if I'd been the one dancing with you all night, instead of whoever you're there with."

He aimed the words straight at Blaine's heart.

"I have to go," Kurt said.

Blaine heard the click of the disconnected line and stared at his phone for a moment. He knew he should try to talk to Kurt again as soon as possible, but he also knew that if he called right away, the background noise would just fuel Kurt's anger. Better to wait a while.

He pocketed his phone, and turned back to the table, nearly stumbling into a body.

"Everything OK?" Christian asked, catching Blaine by the arm.

****

Kurt sat on the couch, stewing, mad as hell that Blaine would ignore his early and clear concerns about one of them visiting a gay bar without the other.

That had scarcely been a part of their life in New York. He could count in single digits  the number of times they had visited gay clubs since the Scandals debacle, when they felt like dancing and getting sloppy drunk before stumbling home for a hard and fast fuck. And those times, it was as if they were role playing, pretending they'd picked each other up. They would dance and sweat, and grind and touch, then head home, where they wrapped themselves around each other before the front door was fully open. Those nights were not about romance, or about love. They served as a release, a way to exorcise pent up frustrations, and act on something purely physical: fast, intense and usually loud. But at its conclusion, they would caress and love as they would in their gentlest of moments.                                                   

On the rare occasion that they visited a club, it was merely the backdrop for a game, one that could stir a vivid enough memory to pique Kurt's interest in finding Blaine all over again, and ghosting his skin with his lips until they once again fell into each others' arms.

 _Don't even think about it, Hummel. Not now_.

But it was too late.

Kurt felt a flush starting its slow crawl across his cheeks, and allowed himself to give in to it.

He drifted off to their last visit to The Ritz, when Blaine texted him from work, saying he was wrapping up early, and how they should meet up for a drink. Kurt would usually just join him at the piano bar, but Blaine had other plans:  _Meet up in the Ritz first floor bar? Come ready to dance._

He had climbed into the skinniest of skinny jeans -- a pair that on more than one occasion had caused Blaine to stare blindly at Kurt's ass as he walked from the room -- and a thin-as-a-spiderweb shirt in soft, sheer silk over a tank top. Paired with heeled boots, his look was long, lean and darkly ethereal.

He saw Blaine standing toward the back of the crowded bar, in a tight black t-shirt fitted so close to his body that it revealed every contour of his torso, and snug dark wash jeans that left little to the imagination. So many people thought of Blaine as a bit of a puppy -- loyal, enthusiastic and just this side of hyper -- but they clearly had ever met  _this_  Blaine, his dark hair, dark eyes, dark demeanor that screamed sex.

Kurt paused mid-way across the bar, already approached by another man offering to buy him a drink. Blaine looked up, keeping a laser focus on Kurt while he ordered a vodka-cranberry, and staring intently as he navigated across the crowded room. He approached from behind, hooking his arm around Kurt's waist to hand him his drink, and nuzzle his neck.  "He already has a drink," he said, deeply, possessively, shooing the other man away.

He molded his body Kurt's, slipping the tips of his fingers under the waistband of his jeans, exhaling into his ear, and beginning the sweet, slow grind that was a harbinger of things to come.  "Drink up," he murmured, beginning to move. "I want to dance."

No, they did not visit gay clubs for a brief drink and social hour with friends. Not ever.

****

He must have been staring at the wall for close to an hour before the thought struck him. He powered up his laptop and opened the web browser to a travel site. Could he get a last-minute flight using Orbitz or Travelocity? Could he even afford the sudden need to travel? Could he afford not to?

 _I can make this work_ , Kurt thought. Thirty minutes of searching confirmed it. He could do this.

He picked up his phone, made a couple of quick calls to his employers, and repeated his apologies and confirmed his contact information with them via text.

He grabbed his suitcase from the closet. Granted, he wouldn't have as much time as he usually allowed himself for planning a travel wardrobe. No spending hours mixing and matching possible combinations across his bed. He had to move efficiently, packing clothes that could multitask, and be suitable for hot summer days, up to two weeks' worth. Maybe one suit, something that could move from day-to-evening, on the off chance he would need it.

He methodically ticked off his mental checklist: Short sleeved casual shirts, long sleeve dress shirts, jeans, slacks, undershirts, shoes.  _There is never enough room in carry-on luggage for enough shoes for every outfit_ , he groaned. Loafers and Converse would have to do. Accessories. They always take the longest time to figure out. I'll have to streamline that, he thought. The toiletry bag. Was it still supplied from the weekend trip he and Blaine had taken to Lima? Toners, moisturizers, travel-sized toothpaste, a last condom. 

Good enough. 

He set the bags aside, readied himself for bed and for an early morning flight, and realized he wouldn't get a minute of sleep. As exhausted as he was, thoughts raced through his head.

Did he overreact? He knew he should have called Blaine back, should have let him explain. He should have apologized -- for hanging up, for jumping to conclusions, for ignoring the voice messages. Instead, he spent a few restless hours in bed and found himself the next morning on the M60 bus on his way to LaGuardia.

****

Having given up on trying to fly strictly carry-on --  _Who am I kidding_ , he thought -- he struck a delicate balance between roller case, carry-on and satchel. Hard-side luggage is a bitch to carry, but it protects the wardrobe -- and one  _protects the wardrobe at all costs._  

He deposited the roller case with a skycap and made his way through TSA, through the terminal toward his gate,stopping at an airport sundry store for gum and the latest copy of Vogue. Near the cash register stood a display rack of postcards. He glanced at it blankly for a moment, then decided to take a look. Turing the circular rack, he looked at dozens of cards: Pictures of the Brooklyn Bridge, of the Chrysler Building. Cards commemorating the heroes of 9-11. Photographs of Times Square.

The he saw it. Simple, a classic image, and one that summed the city up for him. He added it to his purchase, along with a stamp.

 _I may regret this_ , he thought.


	12. Chapter 12

Days passed with no word from Kurt. No returned calls, no texts, no emails. 

Nothing.

Blaine knew he didn't have time for this. Not today. He had been asked by Cameron to sit in on a session, and maybe even contribute backup vocals, for a new artist NSO had  signed, a woman with gospel roots about to get her big break. Her style was described as a classic R&B vibe with modern vocal flourishes. "Whitney meets Aretha," Cameron said. The producer had a hunch that she and Blaine might click vocally, and he wanted to test that theory.

Today was huge, the day he'd been waiting for, but Blaine couldn't focus. He shaved, then checked his phone. He dressed, and looked at email. He ate, sort of, then checked his phone again. He circled the house, once, twice, three times looking for his keys before finding them in his pocket.

He couldn't start his day like this.

He grabbed his phone again and called the Hummel-Hudson home, hoping that Burt or Carol had at least heard from Kurt.

"Good morning, Mr. Hummel? It's Blaine."

"Mr. Hummel is my dad, Blaine. It's Burt to you. How ya doin', son? L.A. treating you well?"

"Well, it's certainly keeping me busy, sir ...  _Burt_..."

"That's more like it. I suspect you're looking for Kurt?"

"Is he there? Oh, thank ... thank ... you," Blaine said with obvious relief. Burt could hear the worry in his voice trickle through the crackling phone line.

"What? He didn't tell you? He's been here since Saturday."

"I think it may have been a last-minute decision. We've both been ... busy. I guess maybe we just didn't connect."

"Is that really it?"

Blaine couldn't lie, and certainly not to Burt Hummel, who was more a dad to him than his own father had ever been. He respected Burt, had always admired and wanted the relationship Kurt shared with his father. He loved Burt like he assumed sons loved their fathers.

"No, I don't think so, sir."

"Blaine, lay off the 'sirs,' OK? What happened between you and Kurt? Because he's not talking. But something's not right when he just shows up out of the blue."

Burt couldn't have read the situation clearer, Blaine thought. Kurt was a planner. He rarely acted on whims. If he had it in mind to visit Lima, both he and Burt would have heard about it -- weeks ago. The only exception would have been for an emergency, if Burt's health had failed or something had caused Kurt to f _lee_.

"I think it's just the stress of being apart," Blaine said, justifying the half-truth in his head as mostly accurate.

"Well son, he's not here right now -- he and Carole went shopping, lord help us -- but I can have him give you a call."

Blaine doubted that would do the trick, but thanked Burt, assured him that he wouldn't be a stranger, and sent his love to Carole.

"And Blaine? Whatever's going on, I don't have the slightest doubt my son loves you. Always has. You take care, son, and I'll be sure to have Kurt call you."

Blaine hung up, assured, at least, that he knew where Kurt was and that he was alright. He picked up his satchel from the kitchen counter, quickly thumbing through the previous days' mail that Cooper had dumped in a pile next to it.

A bill. A couple of supermarket mailers. 

A postcard.

He quickly flipped it over and scanned the words for hints of the story he assuredly already knew by heart.

 

_Blaine,_

 

_It's hard to imagine a more amazing city, but I'm going to leave it behind for awhile. Going home for a visit, then coming home to stay._

_Kurt_

It was postmarked on the day after they last spoke.

Blaine turned the card over in his hands, shaking his head slowly and briefly wondering how he was going to fix this. He simply didn't have the time to dwell on it.

He rushed to work, darting in to the office minutes before the rest of the administrative staff began trickling in. Cameron Elliott wasn't far behind them. This was going to be an early and possibly very long day.

They walked with side-by-side down the halls, to the basement studio where they would be working, Cameron filling Blaine in on the their work for the day.

"She was a studio singer, working backup and doing some commercials. Then I heard her in  a club. I haven't heard pipes like that since Mariah," he said, opening the studio door. "I want you two to meet, maybe try a couple of songs and see how it feels. Blaine, I'd like you to meet ..."

"Mercedes?!?" Blaine shrieked, rushing forward and enveloping her in his arms. "I can't believe this!"

"Well if it's not Blaine Warbler! How are you, honey? How's Kurt? Are you living out here now? I haven't heard from you guys in ages!"

"And I'm guessing you two don't need an introduction?" Cameron said, looking back and forth between the reunited singers.

"Cameron, Mercedes and I go way back."

"High school show choir," Mercedes said, finishing Blaine's sentence.

"National championship high school show choir," they added in unison.

"Have I just created a monster?" Cameron asked, laughing. "I can tell you two would like to catch up, but we've got a lot of ground to cover today. Mercedes has a showcase on Thursday, and I'd like to get this wrapped so we can get that promo out."

****

Mercedes had been playing occasional weeknight gigs opening at the Catalina Bar & Grill, a Los Angeles jazz club whose stage had been graced by names like Gillespie, Corea and Marsallis over the years. It was at the Catalina, a few months earlier, that Cameron had discovered her and eventually offered her a contract. She'd been building a career, mostly as a backup singer for R&B and pop acts, but was about to try the jump to solo artist. 

This week, she would be a featured performer at a private NSO event there in front of dozens of music industry executives and performers. Cameron scheduled the studio time this week to polish a couple of tracks for a promotional release and to fine tune a couple of songs for the event. Despite Mercedes' big voice, Cameron wanted to fill out the  sound -- more than the piano and bass accompanists Mercedes usually worked with -- and called in additional musicians and back up singers for the rehearsals.

That's when he got the idea to give Blaine a try-out. He hadn't been around when Cameron signed Mercedes, but as Cameron listened to the songs they had developed for her, he started hearing the voice from that late night in the New York piano bar. There might be something there, he thought.

"Mercedes, I was toying with the idea of making a couple of these duets for Thursday for variety's sake. What do you think?"

"If you'd brought in just anybody I would have said 'Hell no,' Cameron. But I can't say no to my boys."

Blaine's smile was effervescent. "I'll make you deal," he said. "I'll be your duet partner Thursday if you'll be my plus-one at a sunset wedding on Friday." 

"Deal, so long as I'm awake," Mercedes said.

They worked all day and part of the night, and only after they finished did they get a chance to caught up, over dinner, sharing a wood-fired pizza and stories for hours.

"It looks like L.A. agrees with you," Blaine said. "You look beautiful."

"I look happy," she said. "Thanks -- and it does. It hasn't always been easy, but this is it. I know it. I'm where I belong, and I'm not leaving unless it's on a Gulfstream. How about you? I thought you were still in New York. What's our boy think of you living here? I'm gonna put myself out there and guess  _he hates it_."

"You know him too well. It's just a summer, but it's been a little rough."

"Give him time. He's stubborn, but he's not stupid. He'll figure it out. He always does in the end."

****

Kurt set aside the towel and set the last of the freshly-washed plates away in an overhead cabinet for Carole. 

The last few days had gone a long way to relieving his stress. Something about repetitive, familiar tasks had a way of comforting him. And updating Carole's closet had always given him joy. She was now the proud owner of practical-yet-not-entirely-unfashionable pumps, two day-to-night dresses and a drawerful of accessories to update salvageable parts of her wardrobe. It wasn't McQueen, but it was an improvement, and Kurt couldn't have been happier about it.

But the environment changed when he learned that Blaine had called the house. It may have been inevitable, he probably should have called Blaine to let him know that he was going to go home for a few days to clear his head, but he didn't, and apparently he hadn't seen the postcard yet -- which may or may not have been a good thing. Since that call, Kurt had endured endless hints, suggestions and out-and-out demands from his father that he open up about his motivation for the sudden, unannounced trip.

"I'll never complain about you coming home, son, but don't you think you booked the wrong flight?" Burt said as they put the dishes away.

"What are you talking about?"

"What are you doing in Lima, Kurt? Why didn't you fly to Los Angeles?"

Kurt shook his head, covered his mouth in an almost prayerful way and took a deliberate breath.

"I'm not sure it would matter at this point. I think he's already gone."

"He didn't say so in so many words, but he was worried sick about you, Kurt. What were you thinking just up and leaving like that without telling him? I didn't raise you like that."

Kurt honestly didn't know. His response was automatic: Go home, and avoid the inevitable conflict that would come with a trip to the West Coast.

"You'll never know if you don't try, son, and I do know this: Your young man called here in a panic because he hadn't heard from you. He didn't know where you'd gone, and I could tell he was worried to death that something had happened to you. Does that sound to you like someone you've lost?

"It's pretty obvious that he loves you. I think he always has. But wasn't there a time when you had to go out and see if you could make it on your own? You just knew a lot earlier than he did that you needed to find it. And even if he has moved away, do you think that's changed the way he feels about you?"

Kurt nodded to himself. "Probably not, I guess."

He looked up at his father, his eyes hazy and red. "I've made a terrible mistake, haven't I?"

"We learn from our mistakes. Mistakes make us stronger, so long as we're willing to learn from them," Burt said. "Kurt, it's moments like this than define us. You have to be able to ask yourself: What's more important? The city, or the man?"

"You're right," Kurt said. "Have I told you how much I miss you?"

"Only every day, Kurt. And don't ever forget, ..."

"Yeah, I know," half rolling his eyes. "I matter."

"You both do, Kurt."

****

He didn't call Blaine, but he did send a text after the cajoling.

_Blaine -_

_I should have told you I was going home. I'm sorry, & I'm OK. I just need a few days on my own. _

_Please believe me when I say love you._

_K_

"Please come home," he said quietly, hitting send before he could will himself to type it.

He was a mess, his head swimming with ideas he knew he shouldn't believe, but he just couldn't help himself.

He always knew he could trust Blaine, but when it really mattered, he hadn't.

Now, he'd left Blaine alone and without the emotional support he needed, and he wasn't sure if he could repair whatever damage he might have done to their relationship. But he knew he had to try -- at least try to explain himself, and apologize. Whether or not Blaine was willing to accept it at this point was uncertain.

At this point, he feared calling Blaine. He couldn't initiate this conversation over the phone, especially since he'd avoided talking to him for close to a week. He paced the floor of his old bedroom, picking up the old framed photograph of their first prom together, when Blaine set aside his own fears to step forward and save Kurt from humiliation.

He looked over every detail of the photo. The crown that made him tower over his boyfriend as they slow danced in public for the first time. The trim black suit that fit Blaine like a glove. The balloon drop that started at the perimeter of the gym and worked its way inward. It made them feel, for once, that the world revolved around them rather than the private little orbit they had established together around McKinley High, and even Dalton before it.

The dance that began on such a sour note, saved by the boy who had reason to fear it far more than Kurt did.

He held the framed picture close to his chest, closed his eyes and tried to relive the brief, sweet slow dance.

It was time.

****

With Kurt in his room, Burt picked up the phone and scrolled through the Caller ID. He found the number he was looking for, and hit redial.


	13. Chapter 13

Blaine scanned through his phone's web browser, trying to find just the right picture. There was no time for a postcard.

That was it. The crimson curtain. The empty stage, save for the Steinway Grand and a couple of music stands. 

Click. Save. Text: Kurt Hummel

 

 

First gig, with a duet parter whose voice can part the heavens. One hint to her identity:  **You slept with her.**  

He stopped for a beat and waited. If anything could roust Kurt from his self-imposed silence, it was a sentence like that. A minute later, he was proven right. 

 _Whaaaaa? You know I've never ..._  

Think slumber party, Kurt.  ... And thanks for responding. 

 _WHO?_  

Think. 

Blaine's delight at nudging Kurt into conversation was doubled when they began to slip into their familiar, flirty banter that had been missing lately. 

 _OMG MERCEDES!!!!!_  

Ten points for Mr. Hummel.  

 _You're singing with Mercedes? When?_  

Thursday. It's her gig -- she signed with our label and this is sort of a coming out party. 

 _Excuse me? ( ;_  

You know what I mean. It's a showcase, NSO showing off the new talent. 

 _And she asked you to sing?_  

Actually, it was Cameron's idea. He wanted me to meet his new act ... Little did he know. 

We're singing a couple of songs together -- and Kurt, she's singing one of mine. 

 _I wish I could see that._  

You could, you know.  

He waited. No response. So he pushed, needing Kurt to address the ill-defined issues that seemed to be plaguing them. 

I know you don't want me to call you right now. I know it and I'll respect it, even if I don't understand it. But I have to know Kurt: Are we OK? 

He waited again, longer than he would have liked considering he hoped for a simple, one word affirmation.

 _I hope so. I want us to be. I've decided to come out there. I can't make it in time for your show. I'm sorry. But if I can take some more time off, I'll be there -- if the offer still stands._  

Of course it does, Kurt. It always does. 

He didn't know exactly when Kurt would arrive, but Blaine now was certain that he would. He didn't have much time to prepare. He opened his contacts, and hit 'dial' for the one person who could pull this together. 

"Susanna? It's Blaine. I need your help, and it's kind of urgent." 

**** 

From the outside, the Catalina Bar and Grill looked more office building than nightclub. Visitors had to enter through the back, from a parking garage, which was a better view perhaps than the aging motel and drug store across the street from the front entrance. But as the club readied for showtime, it became the sultry capital for West Coast jazz, its whiskey lights casting uncertain shadows across an intimate stage. 

Mercedes dressed to stand out, as if her voice didn't do that on its own. Radiant in plum Badgley Mischka chiffon, she owned the stage, easily drifting from power pop to soft, sweet soul.  

Interspersed with the Whitney and Adele covers, Cameron had prepared a couple of original songs tailored to Mercedes' voice: A whisper of a love song followed by an explosion of gospel-tinged R&B. 

Deep into her set, she paused and introduce "an old friend." 

"We sang together as teenagers trying to win a trophy. I'm so happy to be singing with him again as we're reaching for the brass ring." 

Blaine took a seat at the piano, and the two broke into Vision of Love, reinventing the Mariah Carey classic as a promise between lovers. 

Then she broke into Blaine's song,  _Missing You_ , a soulful lament that Mercedes knocked out of the park, Blaine backing up on lyrics that were painfully close to his heart.

 

_[God knows I'm trying to keep you out of my head](http://open.spotify.com/track/4gDgwZgU5fazuEARvMkUqL) _

_[I ain't trying to love no one](http://open.spotify.com/track/4gDgwZgU5fazuEARvMkUqL) _

_[I ain't trying to get hurt again, no](http://open.spotify.com/track/4gDgwZgU5fazuEARvMkUqL) _

_[But there's something that just gets in my skin](http://open.spotify.com/track/4gDgwZgU5fazuEARvMkUqL) _

_[And all I know is I can't let go](http://open.spotify.com/track/4gDgwZgU5fazuEARvMkUqL) _

  

Her set left a buzz in the air and a circle of industry insiders around the stage. What was unexpected and a little unnerving for Blaine was that he received as much attention as his longtime friend. He tried to step aside, step back, turn the spotlight over to Mercedes, but guests followed, introducing themselves, offering congratulations. 

Blaine saw himself as playing a supporting role in the performance. He was thrilled that Mercedes had made the last-minute decision to perform one of his songs -- one he had played for her in the studio only two days earlier -- but he was supposed to be a background  player. A couple of duets, that's all. 

But the NSO executive suite apparently didn't see it that way. Neither did the three producers who stepped up and asked if he planned on recording any time soon, and if he had more songs like that in his repertoire. 

Mercedes eventually wandered across the stage to where Blaine stood, planting a kiss on his cheek and a drink in his hand. "Scotch for success," she said. "I don't think I was the only one launching a career tonight." 

"Not my intent," Blaine said quietly, shaking his head.

"Doesn't matter to them. And it doesn't matter to me so long as I'm not upstaged. And I'm not about to let that happen. Cheers." She clinked their glasses. 

"You are one of a kind, you know," Blaine said, sipping the drink. "You look beautiful and you sounded gorgeous tonight." 

"I know," she said with a smug smile. "But it doesn't hurt to have good material," she whispered. "So thanks for that. It's a keeper. Too bad our boy couldn't be here to hear it." 

"Ugh. Yeah. But he's on his way, I think. Burt said he expects him to catch a flight this weekend, and Kurt sounds like he's finally committed to the trip." 

"Did he give you an itinerary? When does he get in?" 

"He's very cryptic." 

Cameron walked up and wrapped Mercedes in his arms, a bear hug of congratulations. 

"And she's on her way! Great job, Mercedes, terrific set -- and you've got a line of other producers wanting to work with you. And you," he said, turning to Blaine. "I'd like a word, when you have a minute." 

"Is there a problem? Anything I can help you with?" 

"When you have a minute."

**** 

Blaine had agreed to help at an after party, a more intimate get-together in the presidential suite at the W, where he would baby sit a baby grand, playing and perhaps singing songs intended more as background music than entertainment. 

He started softly and discreetly, instrumentals only, interspersing familiar tunes with improvised flourishes and surreptitious inserts of some of his own songs. Who would know, really? He played to fill the vacant gaps in conversation during drink orders and hors d'oeuvre noshing. 

He volleyed back and forth, playing snippets of past Top 40 songs and of memories ...  _Misery ... Teenage Dream ... Somewhere Only We Know._ As his mind drifted to the weekend, he added songs he connected with Kurt:  _Blackbird ..._ even _Defying Gravity._

After years of being a frontman, he had learned to enjoy the shift to background player, the musical decor for the embellished room. The intended anonymity gave him freedom to explore nuances in the music that standing at the mic never allowed. It reminded him of the hours in the practice rooms of Juilliard, the hours alone with his thoughts and a keyboard; attacking the music, then willing it forward, coaxing it from his hands and his heart. 

Those were the moments he treasured. Not the solos. Not the applause. Not the gigs fronting friends' bands. Not even the moments leading his beloved Warblers. Those had all mattered once, back when he needed affirmation that he was worth it. But time, maturity and maybe love had changed that, save for a solitary person. Kurt's opinion, Kurt's  _acceptance_ , of his performances always mattered. 

He'd grown confident in himself, and found the peace he'd always lacked by focusing inward. He could still hold a room in his hand, he just didn't need to any more. 

He had grown to love the intimacy of writing, creating and developing music from its first notes to its final, polished  form, and he was learning the craft from some of the best in the business, many of whom were in the room, some beginning to gather around the glossy black enamel Yamaha he was currently seated at. 

A hand on his shoulder, a sing-song voice in his ear. 

 _"I know what you're thinking."_  

Mercedes cozied up, resting her forearms on Blaine's shoulders, whispering. "No one else in this room knows it, but those songs are the story of your life, Blaine Anderson. And those last two -- they weren't yours. 

She smiled. She  _knew_.  

"By the sounds of it -- and by the whispers in the room -- I'd say you have a lot on your mind." 

"Mmmm. You could say that," he said, focusing more intently than ever on the keys. 

"They're gathering, Blaine. They're not going to let this be your private refuge forever." 

He looked up from the piano, looked around the room, then looked her straight in the eye.  

"I know." 

**** 

Confirm. Click. Purchase. 

Done. 

Kurt had finally made a commitment that had made his stomach churl, and he didn't entirely know why. 

But after a couple of calls, he was cleared for take-off. "We'll survive," said his Starbucks manager. She wasn't thrilled, but she wasn't objecting, either. Soriano was a little more blunt about Kurt extending his time off.  

"It's about fucking time. Go get him," he said. 

So, with a little trepidation about what the future may hold, he found a seat on Southwest that could get him to Los  Angeles by the late afternoon on Saturday without breaking the bank. Not that it mattered. Burt insisted on buying the ticket, no matter what the cost, if it meant that his son would "do what you should have done weeks ago." 

 _Well, I guess I know where he stands_ , Kurt thought. 

He began the regimen of pre-packing his luggage, trying to force his stress into the far corner of his brain. 

It didn't work. He would fold a shirt then stop, absent-mindedly thumbing the collar and thinking about how to navigate the clumsy, uncomfortable conversation ahead, and how to explain his attitude these past few weeks. 

If he was being honest, it would have included blunt inquiries:  _Are you seeing someone else? Who is this Christian guy and why is he such a big part of your life? Do you ever intend to come home?_  

If he was being brutally honest, he would have had even tougher questions for himself:  _How could you doubt him? Is he not allowed this? Are you not supportive of Blaine getting the same chances at success that you've had?_  

But it boiled down to one undeniable fact: Kurt missed him. He wanted Blaine back, and soon. He wanted to settle back in to their domesticated bliss, finish college and get on with their lives and careers. And the longer Blaine was gone, the more uncertain Kurt felt about whether he would return to New York. 

He had made new friends, important jobs contacts and discovered a life that hadn't included Kurt -- and that was unnerving. 

He didn't just want Blaine back, he wanted him back in their apartment, in their bed, in their life -- as soon as possible. 

He took his phone and sent a simple, one word text: 

 _Saturday_. 

**** 

The last 48 hours had been a blur, between the showcase at the Catalina, and the after party, and the Friday evening wedding and reception. 

But in the center of the whirlwind, Blaine felt he'd found some clarity. He knew what he had to do. 

Whether it would be as clear to Kurt was uncertain.


	14. Chapter 14

Blaine cut his evening short, as best he could. He had taken Friday off, as had most of the office, and squeezed in time downtown, with Susanna, knowledgable and affable one minute, brusk and intimidating the next, at his side.

So familiar with how to make things work, Susanna was a valuable ally. He had spent much of the morning talking himself in and out of things, trying to decide how the latest complications would factor into his actions.

"Do you know what you're going to do?" Susanna asked.

"I know what I want, and I know what I need. They don't always line up perfectly," Blaine said.

****

The pieces were in place, the wheels in motion, Blaine just needed to settle what felt like a thousand tiny details, so he cleaned the house. He picked up the dry cleaning. And then he waited. And fidgeted. And waited some more.

_C'mon Kurt. Just 'Saturday'? Couldn't you have been a little more specific? I can't just sit here._

There were only so many nooks to dust, or rooms to vacuum. So he picked up the phone.

"Mr. Hummel?"

"Blaine, what did I say ..."

"Hi Burt ..."

"... better. How can I help you, son? Kurt make it in on time?"

"Well, that's just the problem, sir ..."

"Burt ..."

"Yes, Burt. I don't know when he's coming in. He didn't say."

"That son of mine. At least we got him on the plane, but for some reason, he wanted to surprise you, or at least surprise you as much as he could with you knowing he was flying out today. I thought we'd talked him some sense not him. It's ridiculous. You don't need to tell me."

"By any chance, do you have his itinerary? I could pick him up at the airport."

"Afraid I don't, son, but I think he gets in around 4."

"Thank you, Burt," Blaine said for the first time sounding confident calling Kurt's father by his first name.

"See? That wasn't so bad. And Blaine, some day I'd like it if you started calling me dad."

 Blaine didn't expect that. He took a deep breath.

"I'd like that, too, some day. Um, Burt, there's one other thing I wanted to talk to you about ... 

Formalities finally dropped, the conversation went on for another half hour at least. Blaine lost track of time, and Burt appreciated that the young man he had known for so long had finally treated him like a member of the family. Because for as long as Burt could remember, he considered Blaine a part of the Hudson-Hummel household.

If Kurt wasn't landing until late afternoon, Blaine still had time to kill, and energy to burn. He knew he couldn't just wait around the house until Kurt showed up. He'd drive himself crazy if he did. So he threw on shorts, an old T-shirt and running shoes, and drove himself to the front gates of Runyon Canyon. 

****

He killed two hours on that hill, circling its byzantine path, then circling it again. As had become custom, he greeted other hikers, some familiar to him, other strangers. He scratched dogs' heads. He offered his space in line for the water cart to a couple of older women. He kept all his familiar habits in place, calming his nerves as the hike calmed his body. And when he felt  _just tired enough,_ he turned around to go home.

There was no street parking to be found anywhere near the hillside cottage -- not at all unfamiliar in the Hollywood Hills -- so Blaine parked nearly a full block away, and quietly made his way back to the house. 

As he approached, he saw Kurt on the front porch, collapsed in an oversized patio chair, luggage at his side. He was focused on his iPhone, distractedly thumbing the phone with one hand while resting his chin on the other. Kurt hadn't noticed his approach, so Blaine took a moment to take in the sight. 

As always, Kurt had taken great care in selecting his travel wardrobe: Stylish enough to be,  _to be Kurt_ , but casual enough to handle a long flight. Dark pants, not jeans, but not quite as formal as slacks, either, skimming his thighs. Ankle boots with just enough heel to give him an extra long, lean look. A white, narrow-collared shirt neatly tucked underneath a dark but lightweight watchman's jacket, a design so unique, it had to have been a new one of Kurt's.

On his jacket collar, neatly pinned, rested the puzzle-heart brooch.

Blaine crossed his arms, swung out a hip and smiled.

"Hello, handsome. Looking for something? Texting your boyfriend, maybe?"

"Hi."

"Hi, yourself," Blaine said, the two awkwardly staring at each other for a moment before realizing that  _this is the moment that you fall into each others' arms._

They stood there, tangled in each other, before Kurt pulled off. "Ugh! You're sweaty!"

"Mmm ... don't care."

Blaine shifted his hands and held each side of Kurt's face, drawing him back in for the kiss he should have started with. He snaked a hand to the back of Kurt's head to draw him closer, and closer still.

He had no intention of being discreet, of caring about the neighbors, deciding to make up for lost months with a a deepening kiss that had long since passed delicate and blew past sweet on a quick path to dirty.

"I missed you," Blaine murmured. 

"Mmmph. Hello to you, too," Kurt said, coming up for air. "Maybe we should take this inside?"

Blaine fumbled for his key with one hand, caressed Kurt's cheek with the other, dotting kisses across his face. A turn of a key, a foot aimed at the toe kick, and the door slammed open, Blaine pulling Kurt in along with him.

"Suitcase!"

With a huff, Blaine reached out, grabbed the bag, pulled it along, just inside the threshold, and slammed the door shut. 

"Good?" he asked, reaching once again for Kurt. They kissed, and kissed some more, with hands beginning to weave and wander. Kurt shifted a hand to Blaine's chest, pushing at him lightly.

"Whew. Blaine ... honey ... slow, slow down. A moment, need a moment." Blaine looked at him expectantly. Kurt would have nothing of it, not yet. "We have plenty of time. Please. Show me where I can put my things, and you can go get cleaned up while I unpack." 

In his cleaning spree the day before, Blaine had cleared drawer and closet space, and arranged all the new wooden hangars he had purchased in anticipation of Kurt's arrival. He showed them off to Kurt with a certain amount of pride, earning himself a wistful smile.

"I see you were ready for me."

"Always," Blaine said, his eyes bright, his voice dark. 

Kurt grabbed him by the shoulders and turn him around, pointing him toward the bathroom.

"Shower. Then ' _always_ '," he said.

Blaine tore off his sweaty t-shirt and slung it across the room, catching Kurt's eye,  holding the gaze as he peeled off his shoes, socks and shorts in smooth rhythm, then walked toward the bathroom. 

He paused and peeked over his shoulder as he reached the door, and with a crooked smile and a hip sway, hitched his thumbs in the waistband of his heather gray boxer briefs. 

He raised his eyebrows in invitation. Kurt rolled his eyes.

"Shower." 

And with that, Blaine peeled off his last vestige of clothing and sauntered into the bath.

Kurt unpacked meticulously, shaking his head and picking up the pace as he listened to sounds of a flowing shower and a sonorous tenor. Blaine had  _always_  sung in the shower, even back at Dalton: Bright lively pop when he was happy. Classics -- Sinatra, Simone -- when his heart was full. Even his low moods were accompanied by the humming of Beethoven.

_[You are so beautiful, to me](http://open.spotify.com/track/7nb2hZWBxeG38lwcRjFqn4) _

_[Can't you see? ](http://open.spotify.com/track/7nb2hZWBxeG38lwcRjFqn4) _

_[You're everything I hoped for](http://open.spotify.com/track/7nb2hZWBxeG38lwcRjFqn4) _

_[You're everything I need](http://open.spotify.com/track/7nb2hZWBxeG38lwcRjFqn4) _

_[You are so beautiful, to me](http://open.spotify.com/track/7nb2hZWBxeG38lwcRjFqn4) _

 

Joe Cocker? That was new.

He looked toward the door, toward the steam, and the song.

Unpacking could wait.

****

Kurt undressed rapidly, folding his pants and setting them over a chair along with his shirt and jacket. He'd normally take the time to hang them. He went to the bathroom, and opened the shower stall to a warm wall of fog.

"I thought maybe you could use a hand," he said, stepping in and gliding his hands up Blaine's chest, leaning in for a kiss.

Kurt licked at Blaine's lip, sucking it gently as he wove his hand up and behind Blaine's ear, pulling him closer, deepening the embrace.

"I thought you wanted to unpack," Blaine whispered.

"I work fast, which is the first and last time I plan on saying that today." 

Blaine erupted in a full face grin, then laughter. "Slow and steady?" he asked, caressing Kurt's shoulder blades, dipping in to kiss his collar bone. 

Kurt reached up to the shower head, turning it toward the wall, then guided Blaine toward it, pressing his back into the tile.

"Kurt ..."

"Shhh. Do you want my hand? My mouth? Or ..."

"Ugh ... Kurt ... Please, please ... want your mouth."

Kurt alternated --  kiss, lick, kiss -- down Blaine's body, using his chest and shoulders to pin him against the shower wall whenever Blaine threatened to arch, or move at all. He lingered at each nipple, biting and teasing to Blaine's groans. His tongue navigated a winding path down his abs, lingering on Blaine's belly, then lightly kissing down, following the sprinkling of dark hair as it grew dense.

"Kurt ..."

"Ssshhhh ... Let me ..."

Kurt's hands followed his mouth's path south, anchoring Blaine's hips. He nosed at Blaine's erect cock, taking it in: Dark, hard, yet velvet-soft, already seeping. God, he'd missed it. He lapped gently at the slit, tasting the pre-cum. He slowly took him in, as far as the head, and suckled, gently at first, then with a growing intensity that that left Blaine pleading.

"Kurt ... please ... oh ...  _please_."

With that, Kurt wrapped one hand around the base of Blaine's cock, securing him, twisting slightly, taking him deeply into his mouth. He traced the vein forcefully with his tongue to Blaine's incoherent pleas.

Lap. Twist. Suck. Moan. Kurt had a pattern and rhythm, developed years before but not used in months, that he knew would be the end of Blaine. Just as Blaine looked like he wouldn't last, Kurt would pause, kissing Blaine's cock gently, giving him a tease, and a brief break.

"Kurt, I'm not going to last. God.  _Please_."

Kurt licked the length, base to tip, and looked up to see Blaine, splayed against the shower wall, head thrown back, the shower's overspray misting his torso and face. It was the look of his fantasies and summer wet dreams, and it was nearly enough to put him over the top 

"C'mon Blaine. Fuck me," he said, taking Blaine back deeply in his mouth, and grabbing his ass with both hands, encouraging him to move his hips. He opened his throat to the thrusts and moaned. 

Blaine responded in kind, able to keep a rhythm only briefly until he came with a shout down Kurt's throat. Kurt held on, gripping, massaging and separating Blaine's ass cheeks as Blaine's thighs contracted and shook through his climax. As he came down, Kurt shifted his hands to Blaine's lower back, supporting him as he began to slide down the wall.

He raised himself up from his knees and leaned in, angling himself for a deep kiss, letting Blaine taste himself.

Blaine opened his eyes.

"Whoa," he said, dazed. "Kurt, fuck. How'd I last a summer without  _that_? Just, whew, fuck me."

"Plan on it," Kurt whispered, laughing softly. "First, you need to get your legs under you again. C'mon. The water's getting cold and we've got a nice warm bed out there."

All Blaine could do was nod, and turn off the water.


	15. Chapter 15

They toweled each other off hurriedly, enough only to avoid soaking the sheets on Blaine's bed. Kurt took Blaine's hand, and he followed, silently, reverently, but took the lead sitting on the edge of the bed, pulling Kurt to him.

He kissed Kurt's hip, seeking  _that_  spot, the one where he knew Kurt's hip bone protruded  _just enough_ to latch his lips and suck  _just hard enough_  to leave notice that he had been there, that  _this_   _spot_  belonged to him.

Kurt swayed, eyes closed, hands tangled in Blaine's wet mop of hair. When he opened his eyes, he saw Blaine looking up at him, eyes dark and pleading. Blaine tugged a little more, bringing Kurt to his side, then rolling him to the mattress until they were prone, face to face. He drew Kurt's face to his, nipping at his ear, his jaw, his neck.  

With a hand to his shoulder, he turned Kurt face-down on the bed, and then continued his trail of deep kisses, down his spine, pausing at the dimpled base of Kurt's back. Blaine laved the spot, caressing Kurt's hips, then moved down his body to begin the slow, wet slide south through his cleft. 

He reached around Kurt's waist and pulled his hips up, just enough to adjust the angle, Kurt compensating by shifting his knees out.

"I wanted to take care of you," he mumbled into the sheets.

"You are," Blaine said in a hushed murmur.

"But ..."

"My turn."

With that, Blaine gently tugged at Kurt's ass, giving his tongue unfettered access. He lapped softly at the hole, using his thumbs to massage around it, then gingerly dipping  in before return to the lap, circle, lap. He shifted, momentarily, to nose at Kurt's perineum, kissing and sucking his balls, before diving back, burying himself cheek-deep in Kurt's ass.

It was nearly more than Kurt could take. His hips rose reflexively to each tiny thrust, each lick, seeking more. He would then force himself down into the mattress, rutting to  find relief.

Blaine tongued and teased, Kurt's moans growing louder with each change in pressure and angle. With a last, penetrative kiss, Blaine rose to his knees. "Turn over, Kurt. Sit up."

Kurt opened his eyes, took a stuttering breath and did what he was told.

Blaine reached back, arranging pillows for Kurt to lean against. He clambered over to the nightstand, fetching the lube and condoms he'd picked up during his errands the day before. Setting the condoms at Kurt's side, Blaine straddled his lap.

"Give me your hand." He squeezed a dollop of lube in Kurt's hand, an raised up on his knees to give Kurt access. 

They locked eyes, and Kurt rubbed the oil in his hands, warming, then reaching. He traced Blaine, from crack to hole to balls and back again, finally circling, circling again to  Blaine's breathy sighs.

Kurt couldn't drag it out long. He wasted little time between the tease of the first finger and the stretch of the second. Blaine stilled for a moment, gasping, then began to rock his hips on Kurt's hand. Kurt moved, stretched, tested.

Blaine clenched his eyes, trying to focus, trying to control his breathing. "More."

"Oh, I don't think you're ready, hon- ..."

Blaine slapped his hand on to Kurt's shoulder, pressing solidly. "More."

Kurt eased a third finger in and paused. Blaine exhaled, let his hand drop to Kurt's chest, and began to move. Kurt crooked a finger and shifted -- here, there -- until a deep moan from Blaine assured him he'd found what he was looking for. 

"Oh, god ... Kurt ... please."

Blaine reached down, dusting his fingertips down his chest, his stomach, pausing at his hips. Then, as if changing his mind, reached to his side for the condoms. He fumbled with the box, writhing while he tried to rip a condom from its wrapper.

"Kurt! A little help, please."

"Mmm. Bossy."

Kurt eased his fingers out of Blaine and helped him shift back further on his lap, far enough for Kurt to roll a condom down his straining cock while Blaine warmed another drop of lube in his hand. He coated Kurt with urgent strokes and raised up on his knees again, letting Kurt align them.

"... been so long," Blaine huffed, sinking down, easing gently at first, then pushing until he bottomed out. They both stilled, just breathing, not even looking at each other, when Blaine's breath hitched. He looked at Kurt and nodded.

He raised up a few inches, just enough for Kurt to thrust back, earning a debauched moan. Blaine rolled his head back, shut his eyes and ground into Kurt, circles, figures eights, trapezoids, he didn't care, so long as he could increase friction between their two shaking bodies, his own erection sliding across Kurt's stomach with their motion, unattended.

Kurt eased himself up, wrapping his arms around Blaine's neck, bringing them face to face. He whispered into Blaine's ear, though he would have been hard-pressed to remember his words. One moment encouraging, another pornographic, he knew that Blaine responded to the sound of his voice during sex, so he rambled on. Blaine responded with more moans, groans, sighs and incoherent exclamations.

They reveled in the closeness of it all, of their bodies connected, chest-to-chest, hip-to-hip, but had difficulty finding the rhythm that both desperately needed. 

"More, Kurt ..."

"Can you turn over?" 

"Hmm?"

"Hands and knees ..."

"Yeah, yeah.  _Yes_."

They separated briefly to adjust, Kurt running his hands along Blaine's sides, his back and his ass as he lowered himself to the mattress. Kurt ran one hand up and down Blaine's spine as he lined himself up, and leaned to whisper in Blaine's ear. "I can't hold back much longer."

"Then don't. Just fuck me hard."

Kurt, never one to disregard Blaine's wishes in bed, he again followed directions, slamming into Blaine, their skin slapping noisily with each harsh thrust.

He reached around Blaine's chest, holding his hand flat to his heart and leaning his head to Blaine's shoulder. Blaine grabbed Kurt's other hand, wrapping it around his erection and holding tight as he guided it to a grueling pace.

Kurt, who had held back as long as possible, couldn't control himself much longer. Blaine knew it, even without the repeated chant of "gonna come" grunted into his ear. "Harder Kurt. Let it go. Harder."

With Blaine's encouragement, Kurt allowed himself the heated release he had put off for so long. He surged forward one last time, trying to pull Blaine back to him with his free hand. They stilled for the pulse, their breathing erratic. "Stay in me, just a moment more," he said, once again tugging at Kurt's hand, stroking himself viciously until he came across their joined hands.

So they remained for the moment, Kurt softening inside Blaine, Blaine holding Kurt's cum-covered hand.

 "Can we just stay like this?" Blaine said with a sigh.

"Not if we care at all about personal hygiene. Come on," Kurt said, kissing Blaine's shoulder. "I need to get up."

He tied off the condom and fetched a moist washcloth from the shower to clean up. 

"Have you ever noticed that if you read porn, the couple always comes together at exactly the same moment?"

"Yeah," Blaine said with a huff. "Never happens."

"Not a once. But we do a damn fine job catching up with each other," Kurt said, giving Blaine a light kiss.

"Mmmm. That we do," Blaine said, sounding for all the world like he was about to fall asleep.

****

Kurt couldn't sleep. He curled into Blaine, resting his head on his chest and silently drawing patterns across his torso, a swirl here, a heart there. Blaine wrapped one hand around his head, as if using the crook of his elbow as a support, and looked aimlessly off to a corner of the ceiling. His free hand found Kurt's head, and knitted its fingers gently into his hair.

 _He looks so alone_ , Kurt thought.

It struck him that in the hours since they'd been reunited, they really hadn't said much at all, save for the  _mores_  and the  _ughs_  and the  _oohs_ and a handful of unwitting religious declarations. Not that he was complaining, not in the slightest. But they normally talked, a lot, and the room was strangely silent.

"What are you thinking about?" he said, with soft kiss to Blaine's chest.

"Just that it suddenly feels like I've come full circle. All this ...," he said, circling his gaze around the room as if he was looking at at the city scape instead of a small bedroom, "All this has been good for me."

"Well, I  _try_  ..." Kurt said.

"I'm not kidding, Kurt. This move. I needed this. I needed to be forced out on my own, to be by myself. I needed to learn how to manage. I needed to learn how to live my life, on my own ... my own terms."

Kurt didn't respond. He wouldn't move for fear of where this might be going.

"Coop's almost never here. I've been pretty much by myself since I moved. I had to make new friends, and for the first time in my life I had to find my way as just as me, not as Blaine Warbler or as Kurt's boyfriend, but as Blaine Anderson. 

"And you know what? I did it. I did it without someone holding my hand and without hiding behind a bunch of jackets." 

"You were never behind them, Blaine. They were behind you. You were front and center at Dalton ..."

"That's not the point," Blaine said, quickly enough that Kurt knew to stop. This was not a time to interrupt.

"I didn't even realize what this was all about until now. When I went to New York? I was running to you. McKinley? I transferred to be with you. And Dalton? I was there to hide, to escape my life. This? This is the first time I can remember doing something by myself, for myself ... I don't know, it's ... it's forced me to stand on my own. I don't know if that makes any sense to anyone but me, but trust me when when I say this was something I needed.

"Look at Mercedes. She did this on her own, straight out of high school. She turned her back on Lima and never looked back. That Sam got her started, then he sent her away ... that may have been the most loving, generous thing I've ever seen.

"Look, I know it's been rough, Kurt, but you let me go when I needed to, even if I didn't know at the time just how badly I needed to do this."

If Kurt could have blended into a wall, or the sheets, he would have in that moment. Instead, he pulled off of Blaine, just enough to give him the freedom to shift to his side. Blaine turned slightly and rolled on to his hip, placing him face-to-face with Kurt.

He took Kurt's hand and looked him in the eye.

"You set me free."

Blaine's eyes pled with Kurt to understand, but the words deafened Kurt to anything else. Blaine took Kurt's hand and held it to his chest. 

"Kurt, we need to talk."

"Right now?"

Blaine nodded. "Right now." 

"Am I going to like what's coming?"

"I don't know.

"Kurt, this should be one of the happiest moments of my life. And in so many way, it is. It really is. You're here. I've missed this, you, us -- so much. But ..."

"There always has to be a but ..."

"Always. ... And you love butts," Blaine said, trying to lighten the mood. Kurt curled his left lip in response, almost imperceptibly, then returned to his brow-furrowed concentration.

"Something's happened, Kurt. Something big."

Kurt could see it coming, like the headlights of an approaching drunk driver, he could see it. He could feel the collision. The best he could do was brace himself for impact.

"It's Christian, isn't it?" he ventured quietly, tensing.

"What? No! Kurt, no. You thought ...? Christian's a friend. Christian's  _married_. He's just got married. He's on his  _honeymoon_  right now, Kurt," Blaine said, his voice a blend of bewilderment and panic. "Oh god ... no Kurt, no. That was the wedding I was at yesterday. It shut down the office for the afternoon."

"Christian got married? But I thought ..."

"I know what you're thinking, but no, Kurt. Christian is  _not_  Sebastian. Not anywhere close. We're friends. We talk. Ends up, we're a lot alike. He was in a long distance relationship," Blaine said. "I guess we kind of bonded over it."

He told Kurt how they had spent hours trying to figure out how to make relationships work when the couples are separated by a continent. For Christian, it meant getting married, and offering to move back to the east coast.

"Geez, Kurt ... I knew something was bothering you, but you thought ...? Didn't you trust me?"

Kurt doubled-back, looking for he words to explain what was ultimately inexplicable. He'd been jealous, and wrong.

"There's no one but you ... you, and my future. 

Kurt hadn't even recovered from the shock of thinking that Blaine may have found someone else, was saying goodbye when he stopped short again.

"What?"

"Something happened, Kurt. This week, after that show at the Catalina, when I sang with Mercedes," Blaine said. "We were only going to sing a couple of duets, but afterwards, Cameron ..."

"He offered you a contract."

There was a time in their history when this moment would have erupted in a patented Pepsodent Blaine Warbler grin and waggle of eyebrows, but not now. Blaine's lips turned up in a tiny, tenuous smile that seemed to ask,  _Is this OK? Is it OK to be happy? Is it OK to follow my dreams?_

"I haven't given him an answer yet."

****

"Why didn't he just do this in New York?" Kurt asked.

They were sitting up in bed now, both propped up on pillows, mirroring each other, their hands in their laps, without touching. 

"It's not just about singing, Kurt. I've been learning the studio, arranging, learning production. There's so much more to music than just playing it."

"So you're going to be a producer?"

"Someday, I hope. There's an option for that path. That's why he waited, I think. We talked about this in New York, about my dreams beyond singing. Cameron's been an incredible mentor to me, Kurt. He believes in me. He didn't rush me into some prefabricated marketing niche. He showed me the music business and let me discover where I fit into it."

"And where do you fit into it, if you sign," Kurt asked, certain that the answer could destroy him.

"Here, at least to start."

"So I've lost you."

"Kurt, there are studios all over the world. I may start here, it makes  _sense_  to start here, but it doesn't have to end here."

"I thought you were coming home. That was the plan, wasn't it? That's what I signed on for, Blaine."

"I  _am_ going back. Before I do anything, I'm going to finish school."

"And then?"

"That's what we need to talk about, Kurt -- how to make this work. 

"Kurt, have you ever considered anything other than New York? Any other possibilities at all?"

"We've never even discussed anything but New York, Blaine. I'm just getting started."

"Isn't that the best time to consider something else, when you're just starting out? Los Angeles has a fashion industry, Kurt. And I've gotten to know people who have contacts in it -- good contacts. People who are willing to help us, Kurt. Do you need to be in New York for your career?

"Could you consider a life here?"

"I'm not done with school."

'Neither am I. 

"I've got Siriano."

"An internship. An important one, I'm not discounting it. But you're going to need a job. And eventually, you'll want to go out on your own. Christian has contacts at Monique  Lhuillier, and he's offered to put in a good word for you."

"Why would he do that?"

"I told you, we had a lot in common. And I showed him your designs. He was impressed -- and he thinks Lhuillier will be, too.

"Kurt, I just want us to be together. I want us to have a life together, but this summer's also taught me how important it is for both of us to be have our own lives, our own goals. It's got to be equal, Kurt. I'm a better man when I'm with you, but I'm more complete when I factor in my needs into our needs, if that makes sense."

"That's a lot to spring on someone at once, Blaine."

"Will you at least consider it? It's all I'm asking. We don't need to decide everything right now. ... Please."

Kurt paused, looking deep into Blaine's eyes. There was little doubt of the sincerity, but this was something Kurt had never even considered.

"OK. I'll consider it. But I can't guarantee that I can go along with this."

"Just promise me you'll keep your mind open to it."

"I will," Kurt whispered.

Though alone, the two had slipped into light, murmured words over the course of their talk.  _Sotto voce,_  treating the subject with quiet reverence, and more than a little fear.

Blaine reached for Kurt's face, cupping his cheek. He stretched his chin up, placing a delicate kiss to Kurt's forehead, the bridge of his nose, his eyelids, his jawline. He pulled back and looked into Kurt's eyes.

"I will," Kurt repeated, almost silently. He could feel the start of a tear forming, and willed it back, shutting his eyes.


	16. Chapter 16

Blaine rose before dawn, carefully prying himself from Kurt's grasp.

He hadn't slept a wink, but didn't move for fear that he'd wake Kurt, whose breath tickled his neck with each deep exhale. But it was time, and he needed to shower, dress and leave as discreetly as possible. 

Kurt's arm wrapped under his own and wove its way around his waist, latching itself to his chest. Disentangling himself without detection would require skill and patience. Like navigating a Twister game, he loosened himself from Kurt's grip and rolled gingerly off the mattress.

He stood in the doorway for a moment and glanced back at the room. Kurt had shifted, sprawled on to his stomach and clutched a pillow like he had Blaine just minutes before. If he could, Blaine would lock them in and stay tangled in Kurt's arms for as long as possible. 

He pulled some clothes from the closet and silently shut the door behind him. 

**** 

When Kurt awoke, it was to an empty bed, and an envelope. 

He looked at it for a minute, avoiding it, sensing he knew what it held. 

He was alone, and he was pretty sure the envelope confirmed it.  

Their reunion may have left him breathless, but he realized that in the 16 hours since Blaine found him on his doorstep, Kurt hadn't told him that he loved him. It wasn't that he didn't -- if anything, his feelings were stronger than ever -- but something about the night before felt off, awkward, out of sync. 

Their night had been boldly physical, but it didn't feel  _intimate_ , at least not in a way that longtime lovers should be. Kurt felt an unfamiliar distance between them. He couldn’t pinpoint it, but something told him that his trip may have been too little, too late. He may have been too quick to criticize Blaine's ideas, and may have shut himself off to opportunities. 

All he really wanted was for Blaine to come back to New York, back to their apartment, back to Kurt's days and nights. Instead, he feared that he had driven a wedge through their nearly six-year relationship. That may not have been 'welcome home' lovemaking, he thought, but it may very well have been a goodbye fuck. 

He didn’t need to pick up the envelope to know what Blaine put in it. 

His heart sank. 

Could he blame him? 

Blaine had tried repeatedly for weeks, for months, to convince him to visit the west coast, and he had steadfastly refused, or changed the subject, or simply gone silent. 

Kurt thought about the postcards and the notes that followed them: The romance of the music Blaine had shared from his first trip to the Hollywood Bowl. The goofiness of the lightsabers. The wonder he found in the living art displays in Laguna. The loneliness he'd conveyed from his canyon hikes.  

Kurt only then began to realize that Blaine had been making an effort to keep them together from the very start, and he'd ignored the signals. 

He'd seen it as a brazen effort to uproot him. He wasn't entirely wrong. Blaine was talking about a permanent -- or at least longterm -- move west, and he'd suggested that Kurt move with him. 

Since high school, Kurt had dreamed of New York, of Broadway and bustling sidewalks and a million people with dreams as big as his own. But he’d also dreamed of the boy in the blue blazer who sang to his soul that first day at Dalton Academy, and nearly every day since.  

But his New York fantasy had changed over the years. His original plan was based on necessity: Broadway stardom required Broadway accessibility. When his career plans shifted, dramatically, New York remained the logical choice for an education, and Blaine had always been on board with following him to the city. 

But California? Kurt had as much as rejected Blaine’s question out of hand:  _Do you need to be in New York for your career? Could you consider a life here?_  

Now Kurt questioned himself. 

 _Could I live here? If I couldn’t, could I live without love?_  

He didn’t have the energy, or the willpower, to answer himself. 

He looked around the room for signs of Blaine's new life, but Blaine had traveled light, and never tried to make Cooper's guest room look or feel like home. The only truly personal item Blaine had allowed himself sat on the nightstand, a small framed photograph of the two of them, snuggled and smiling on a picnic day at Central Park. 

Kurt got up, looking for his phone, checking for texts that didn't exist, then set it down on the kitchen counter. 

He would give Blaine time, and take a shower, and hope that he could wash away the feeling that he had made an enormous mistake. 

**** 

When he emerged from his morning ritual in search of coffee, Kurt's phone was alight with texts. 

Where are you? 

Kurt? 

Have you read it? 

The driver’s gonna kill me. 

The last one got his attention. 

WHAT? 

He turned to the bed, opened the envelope and braced himself for the worst.

 

 

 _I've never felt that I needed a map to your heart, but LA freeways are another matter entirely._  

 _A car service will pick you up at 10._  

 _B_  

Kurt looked  at the top of the screen: 10:38 AM. 

"Shit." 

Kurt tapped out a reply with reckless speed. 

_Hadn’t read your note til now. If he’s still outside, let him know I’ll be right down._

_I’m so sorry._  

 _****_  

Inside the car, Kurt found another envelope. This one contained a photograph of a seaside cliff, and no explanation. 

“Where exactly are we headed?” Kurt asked the driver. 

“I’m sorry, but I’m not at liberty to discuss that.” 

“So I’ve been kidnapped?” 

“I believe you stepped into the car of your own free will, Mr. Hummel. However, if you do not care to continue, I have been instructed to deliver you to the location of your choosing.” 

Kurt could see the slightest smirk of a smile in the rear view mirror. The driver -- smarmy bastard -- was enjoying this. He sat in silence, confused and anxious. 

He called Blaine and was sent straight to voicemail. 

“Keep driving.” 

Not expecting a response, he turned to text. 

 _Would you tell me what’s going on?_  

Are you in the car? 

 _Yes. Would you tell me what’s going on?_  

Afraid I can’t. You’ll have more info soon.

_Blaine ..._  

Kurt? 

 _I’m not in the mood for a treasure hunt._  

Do you trust me? 

 _Sometimes._  

C’mon. Do you TRUST me? 

 _Yes._  

Good. Sit back and relax. 

“Do you mind if I put on some music? It was requested," the driver said. 

“Fine,” Kurt replied. 

The Town Car filled with the sounds of a piano, then an orchestra. Kurt knew the piece. Blaine had shared it with him via email and YouTube link after his first trip to the Hollywood Bowl.  

[The Chopin Nocturne](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGRO05WcNDk&feature=youtube_gdata_player). 

 _One of the most romantic things ever written. ... It's us, Kurt._  

 _It's music to love to._  

He’d only read the words, but he could hear them in Blaine’s voice. 

He could feel the moisture building in his eyes. 

The driver swiftly navigated the incessant congestion of the 101 south, past Capitol Records, toward the skyscrapers of downtown Los Angeles. 

Kurt marveled how the nation’s two largest cities could be so very different from a distance. New York, condensed and compact, bristling with bodies and energy and steel and concrete. Los Angeles, a sprawl of sun-kissed hillside homes clasping a valley center of low-slung stucco punctured by clusters of glass towers. 

Yet at their core, were they all that different? Both cities were the very definition of melting pots. Both cities served as launching points to other continents. And both cities were largely driven by the arts: New York with theater, fashion and museums; Los Angeles with Hollywood, and the music industry. 

And fashion, he reminded himself.  

They turned on the 110 south, the freeway that cuts a swath through the heart of L.A., a concrete line of cultural demarcation. To the right of the double-decker freeway: USC, West Hollywood, Beverly Hills and eventually UCLA. To the left: Watts, Compton, Hollywood Park racetrack and the noisy approach pattern for LAX. 

They drove the entire length of the crosstown freeway, nearing the Port of Long Beach before turning north. Kurt gave up guessing miles ago, when at a stop light, the driver turned and handed him a card. 

Another postcard. 

“For you, Mr. Hummel.”

 

 

It was the image of a glass seaside structure, a stone tower beside it --  _a church?_  -- along a seaside cliff. Unlike previous postcards, it contained no identification and little information, save the unconventional signature line. 

 _With hope,_  

_B_

  

The car arrived in the seaside parking, a garden path leading to the glass-walled structure from the postcard.  

“We’re here. I believe you’ll find what you’re looking for at the end of the walkway, Mr. Hummel, and best wishes.” 

Best wishes? And what was he looking for? Wasn’t that the root of his problems? 

He walked the tree lined path, toward the building. Along a stone wall, a sign designating a historic site: “Wayfarer’s Chapel.” 

He stopped to look for a moment, puzzled by the thought of Blaine sending him to a church. When he looked toward the structure -- a sleek, oversized greenhouse, he thought -- a dark-haired man stood alone by the open doors, fidgeting. 

It was a familiar look. A mass of controlled curls atop his head, a classic wardrobe that defined easy grace and showed off the well-toned body beneath it to its best advantage. A slim cardigan in heather gray. A Cabernet red athletic-cut polo beneath it. Trim gray slacks, hugging the hips and all the right places, rolled to show off trim ankles (and save money on shortening, Kurt knew). 

Blaine, dreamy as ever, fidgeting with something small. His phone? No.  

Something else entirely. 

He looked up to Kurt, his face a maze of wonder and tension. 

“Kurt.” 

“You  _kidnapped_  me.” 

“I'm sorry for all the secrecy. And about abandoning you this morning. I had ... things ... to do. Most of it was already arranged, but ..." 

“Hmm,” Kurt said, his head low, eyes up, walking slowly toward Blaine with his hands behind his back. “So now can you tell me why I’m here? Is this a  _church_?” 

Blaine explained how he had attended the Christian's wedding to his longtime boyfriend  in the chapel, and marveled at both its beauty and its relaxed, embracing atmosphere. The historic church had a long history of welcoming same sex unions, he'd found, and had backed marriage equality during the state's battle over Prop. 8. 

“It was ... I know ... it’s a church, Kurt, but it was so beautiful, so right. The whole time I was here, I thought of you.” 

Kurt tried to blink away the welling tears, and took a deep breath. 

“When I woke up to an envelope, I thought you were gone,” Kurt said. "You  _were_ gone, but I thought you had left me, so I didn’t open it. I didn’t want it to be true. Last night, it felt like the last time. Like we couldn’t recover. Like we were pouring everything into it because we might not be together again. 

“I thought we were over, Blaine.” 

Already on the brink of tears, Kurt finally set his tightly-wound emotions free. It was just enough to tip Blaine over the edge. 

He let it all spill out, everything he was feeling. Everything he was hoping for. The ulterior motive behind the postcards and emails, a phone call to a father, a shopping trip to the jewelry district, a borrowed company car that brought them to the steps of a gazebo-like glass building overlooking the Pacific. 

“I’m sorry, Kurt. I didn’t mean to scare you, or mislead you. I just missed you. So much. And that postcard you sent. It seemed pretty clear that there was no way you would come here, that you wouldn't even consider leaving New York, even to visit. 

"I'm a better person when I'm with you, Kurt. When I'm by myself, I just kind of ... drift. I just wanted you with me, and I knew it was time," Blaine said, searching for the words he'd been practicing for days. 

"Time?" Kurt whispered. 

“Last night, I was nervous, Kurt. I was  _plotting_. I was going over all the details and arrangements. 

"I was afraid you would say ‘no’.” Blaine said, adding softly, “Don’t say no, Kurt.” 

He took a centering breath, and continued. 

“I promised you once to always love you. To defend you even if I knew you were wrong. To surprise you. To always pick up your call no matter what I was doing. To kiss you whenever and wherever you want. And to make sure that you always remember how perfectly imperfect you are.” 

Kurt looked at Blaine's stressed features and thought back to a quiet hallway in an Ohio high school, and the first moment he was promised unconditional, eternal love from the boy he knew would always own his heart. 

“You forgot the cookies,” Kurt said, hushed. 

Blaine blushed, and smiled. “And cookies, fresh from the oven at least twice a year. 

“None of that has ever changed for me, no matter where we are, no matter where life has led us. My life is with you, Kurt. 

"You're my glue. You hold me together, and I'll never be complete without you. 

“I fell in love with this place, but I could never love it more than I love you. I had hoped with the letters and the cards and eventually with a visit, you might see what I saw: Possibilities, a blank slate, a future. I saw opportunities for us, as individuals, as professionals, as a couple. 

“If you don’t see that, my promise to you is that I’ll drop it. But I won’t drop you, Kurt. Wherever you are is my home, and I want it to be that way for the rest of our lives.” 

He knelt on the pathway, reaching for Kurt’s hand.  When he looked up to meet Kurt’s gaze, tears had filled both their eyes. 

“Please tell me you feel the same way. Tell me you haven’t given up on me.” 

Blaine reached into his pocket to retrieve the item he had been fidgeting with: A red ring box which he opened to reveal a simple band of brushed platinum.

 


	17. Epilogue

**Los Angeles  
April 2023**  

Kurt strolled up the steep, winding driveway of the Hummel-Anderson property, distractedly thumbing through the day's mail.

The water bill. The Wednesday onslaught of supermarket mailers. The Nordstrom summer season catalogue. A credit card advertisement. Amidst the morass of paper, he nearly missed the simple white bonded envelope. 

But then he saw it, and paused. Rather than follow the block walkway to the entry of the hillside mid-century modern that had been their west coast home since their marriage four years earlier, Kurt turned left, down a tree-lined garden path that led to the pool area. He settled in a shaded lounge, and turned the envelope over in his hands. 

The right thing would have been to call Blaine and open the letter together, prepared for better or for worse by being at each other's side. But Kurt Hummel-Anderson didn't always do the right thing. 

**** 

Blaine wasn't in his studio, a lofty name for what had been originally built as guest quarters. Now rigged with acoustic tile and recording equipment, it was both his office and retreat, where he could go to tinker on songs that were not quite there yet, both for himself and his growing list of clients. It is also where a variety of guitars, keyboards and musical instruments resided that Kurt couldn't always identify. 

The Steinway inhabited the glass-walled living room, looming over the Hollywood Hills. On the stark white wall behind it, a colorful splash of pop-art: A sunset-hued oversized recreation of a 1950s "Greetings from California" postcard. On the opposite wall, the Grammy, the platinum album and framed sketches from Kurt’s first collection under the KHA label. 

The grand piano was the inevitable centerpiece of parties or dinners with close friends, but it played a far more important role in this contented household. Because on their nights alone, the evenings they treasured most, they sat together, playing old familiar songs, harmonizing and deferring to each other like they had been handed a weekly New Directions assignment.  

It was here that Kurt knew he would find Blaine, because the music drifted down from the home this afternoon, making the sounds of joy, not work. He leaned back in the cushions, sighed and smiled to himself. He looked down the hill, toward the pink-tipped skyline of downtown Los Angeles, then further west toward the ocean, and he considered how easily this moment might never have happened. How one lapsed moment could have blocked even the possibility of this afternoon, this evolving sunset, this life. 

He rose and started to walk toward the house, noticing a lull in the living room rhapsody. Kurt rounded a corner and caught his breath. After 14 years, the sight of Blaine, dressed  simply and comfortably in cuffed Levis and a slim-fit polo shirt, was enough to stop him in his tracks. 

"Why'd you stop?" Kurt asked. 

"I came to find you," Blaine said with a shrug and one of his loopy grins. "Everything OK?"

"Just got a little sidetracked getting the mail," he said, using his nose to point west. "The sun's about to set." 

He reached for his husband's hand, and led him back to the modular lounge, where they stretched into the cushions, curled forehead-to-cheek.

"To think I almost rejected this," Kurt said. "What was I thinking?" 

"I always knew you'd come around. You just had to discover it for yourself," Blaine said.  

"And if I hadn't?"

"Never would have happened," Blaine murmured, earning a wicked side-eye from his husband.

"I can be a little stubborn, Blaine. ... C'mon, I'm serious, don't give me that look. What if I'd never left New York?" 

Blaine's 'Oh really?' smirk evolved, leaving a grin in its wake.  "Home is where you are, Kurt. It's not an address. I would have moved. This just felt so right for us. Why are you thinking about this  _now_?" 

Kurt leaned his head back and crinkled his eyes, part of a full-faced, closed mouth smile that shouted his happiness. 

"You've said that before, you know." 

"I remember," Blaine said earnestly. "In high school." 

"In high school. And when you proposed. You told me that your home was with me." Kurt looked around the lush property, then drifted back to Blaine. "So a house is not a home, you say? A home, it's ... wherever you are, right?" 

"Kurt?" 

"I'm just wondering if it might be time to move."

Blaine shifted, the look on his face somewhere between confused and concerned.  

Kurt smiled. 

"I'm not sure this place is child-friendly," he said, handing Blaine the mail.

****

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it. Successfully (?) transferred over from S&C.


End file.
